Tuesday, May 31, 2011

“That Millicent is unbelievable.”

Author – Arthur, with Millicent’s approval.

She turns up here with Inge the other day and before she’s out of the car she claps eyes on the Hardly Driveable parked out the back.

Just grabs her gear, sashays upstairs with Inge and ten minutes later she’s back down in a pair of snappy jeans, bike boots and this little suede jacket with, would you believe it, the skull and cross bones emblazoned across her back.

Uh, oh, she has Inge’s helmet under one arm, mine in the opposite hand and is pointing to the Hardley with her left foot as she skips through the office toward the back door.
She can’t say much other than mumble ‘cos she’s got her shades clenched between her teeth.
Anyone would think the old dragon was on holiday.

This is ridiculous. I haven’t seen a woman that keen to go out and play biker’s moll for many a year.

Here we are out the back beside the scooter as it warms up.

Looks like this was prearranged between Inge and Millie on their way back from their conference that I, Arthur, should give Millie a motorcycle tour of the town; what with me being the bloke with the most hours up on the shop beast.
Conniving women.

But now she’s in full battle armour, bone dome on head, and all cinched up tight; she doesn’t look half bad from twenty feet away.

Bling.
I don’t believe this dame. She’s popped on her shades. Black framed wraparounds encrusted with a string of marcasite brilliants, gold misted Polaroid lenses, propped on her pert little hooter.

A serious looking lady if you like the foxy sort.
What a transformation from the dusty old dag that climbed out of Inge’s car only a few minutes ago.

Hoo boy. Looks like Arthur gets to squire a movie star around town.
Bound to be trouble when we stop by anywhere anyone recognises Arthur.
Inge will be hearing about this for the next six months.

“Ummm, Millicent.”
“Yes Arthur.”
“Ever been pillion on a big motorcycle before?”
“To tell you the truth, Arthur, only once, quite a few months ago.”
“Will you be okay – I mean you won’t fr –“
“Freak out at the first corner and sit bolt upright?
Hardly make a difference would it, a little old lady like me?”

So on we climbed, made ourselves comfortable, sorted out the intercom, and, kalunk, putt, kerfuffle, blatt, off we went down the driveway and onto the street.

I have no idea why the shop hack just lurched left somehow as we came out onto the street – but lurch left it did, then snapped upright and toddled down the street as if on autopilot.
Normally I have to wrestle with this dog at slow speed, just to get it pointed in the right direction.

“So, where would you like to go Millicent; anything you want to see?”
“You just work the throttle and change gears, Arthur – oh and tweak the brakes when you need to.
Inge worked through the tour with me while we were driving home and I’ve got it all drawn out on this map here - look.”

“Uhhh, Millie.”
“Yes Arthur?”
“Would you please get that map out of my face. I can’t see where I’m going.”
“Oh, righto Arthur.”
“That’s better, now where – oh, to the right around this roundabout.”

Whatever is happening here we’ve executed a 90 degree turn and now, flick, Bingo, we’re heading down the street without me having much say in the matter.

If this dame has only ever once been a pillion on a big bike she’s a damned quick learner with an amazingly retentive memory.

“Millicent?”
“Yes Arthur?”
“When you said you’d only once been pillion on a big motorcycle – what did you mean?”
“Oh, it’s just that I’ve been a passenger on small motorcycles now and again and even bought a license back home.
I was never really fussed with little bikes, Triumphs, Nortons and so on; never felt all that safe.
What do they say, not enough ‘footprint’.
Then one day I visited this motorcycle shop with a friend and colleague.
We were researching this paper about Hunter S Thompson and his influence on motorcycling culture; you know, how it’s panned out lately.
The way silly ageing men afraid of losing their ‘Fallorum’ have driven up the price of what used to be poor man’s transport and elevated motorcycles to status symbols.”

“Dead set, Millie?”
And there it was in the showroom staring me in the eyes; the expression of my own mid-life crisis.”
“What was that Millie, a nifty fifty – Owwww!”

I can tell you for free – always remember you young bikies, that if you are ever doubling some assertive, short fused, feminist strumpet about on your scooter, that they are in complete control. A good sharp jab in the kidneys always sorts you, the chauffeur, out in short order.

“Arthur.”
“Yes Millicent.”
“When we get back to the office I’ll find my scooter’s web-page for you, okay?
We can add it to your ‘further reading’ list if and when you write your article.
But in the meantime just head down this road until I tell you to turn left.”
“So that was your new motorcycle was it? I mean the salesman took you for a ride on it to show you the ropes.”
“Well, a bike similar to mine but set up for a pillion; if you could call it that. That was the only big bike I’ve been pillion on.
No, mine is solo seat but with all the bells and whistles set out the same.”

“Okay Millie; I’m looking forward to checking her out. I guess she’s a she, isn’t she?”
“No, he’s a Montie; named after my ex-husband. Loud, cantankerous, more trouble that he’s worth, but so much fun to be with.
That’s my scooter.
Okay Arthur, left then a quick right up ahead, according to this map, then after the stop sign you can just follow the road.”
“ Right you are ma’am ‘and don’t spare the horses’, as me mum used to say.”

So down the road we roll, up over a bit of a rise and dip, a right hand curve and now we’re cruising along a narrow road, up close along the edge of the riverbank.

Dotted about down there are fishermen in their little outboard powered ‘tinnies’. And check that out, a ketch, sixty, seventy feet, a Canadian, judging by the flag, sails just unfurled, maybe still under power, but carefully following the leads out to sea, barely leaving a ripple for a wake.
She’s definitely a deep keel hull making best use of the tide height, right now working against the last of the incoming to her advantage and being bloody cautious about it.

Barging upstream comes a trawler, pugnacious, GM diesel bellowing loud enough to be heard over the Hardly and sloshing a bow wave clear over the top of a stone breakwater wall barely visible at near high tide.
A couple of  fishermen on the wall grab their creels and as best they can, run for it before they get washed off the rock wall  into the river.

“Ahhhh. My hometown,” thinks I “almost an idyllic scene except for that dickhead in the trawler. Steam gives way to sail - no. Follow the leads – no. Watch for damage to riverine environment caused by propwash/wake – no. Watch for danger to other mariners caused by propwash/wake – no. The fishermen?  Oh Shit, that little kid – whew, Dad caught on and grabbed him just in time. He’s safe now.

Keerist, I’m getting too old for this brainless crap!”

“Hey Millie, did you see that?”
“Unfortunately, Arthur, I did. In a way what we’ve just seen has something to do with why I wanted you to bring me here.
And I’d say we’ve reached the spot where we can stop.”
“What, here – this dump?”
“Yes Arthur, according to the map.”

So we turn on to this muddy, cleared space, a few trees here and there but a clear view of the river.
The view of the river is clear mainly because there is nothing at all to warn the unwary that they could easily miscalculate and drive right over the edge of this cleared space, down about thirty feet and into the river.

I think I’ve worked out what Millicent is up to.
I couldn’t catch her expression behind those classy shades but all the time the river has been visible I’ve felt her sitting up, her head arched, staring over the other side of the river.
Leastways, that’s what she was doing until the toolhead in the trawler did his stuff.

“Can’t make it out, eh?”
“Make what out Arthur?”
“Paddy’s Island.”
“How did you know I was looking for Paddy’s Island.”
“Well, for one thing the Hardly was tracking pretty well until we came down this stretch. Since then it’s been wanting to crab off to the left and into the bloody river. Something to do with a swollen head stuck out in the slipstream, I reckon – Owww! Millicent.”

“Arthur, I swear. I’m beginning to believe that I’ve known you for a thousand years –“

“Anyway Millie; Paddy’s Island is about all there is on that other side of the river – other than mud, mad fishermen, mangroves and mozzies.”
“And if you’re right, Arthur, and I wanted to take a look at this Paddy’s Island. Would you wonder why?”
“Millicent, It’s now past 4pm on an autumn afternoon.
Regard. Evening is approaching and in an hour or so you could watch the sun nosedive below the horizon.
I used to watch that here when I was a kid; dragged along here fishing with my bro and old man.
When they were with me it was just a place: one so peaceful at sunset.
But this place can get scary; it’ll up and bite you badly in a second.
You can be skipping over those rocks like a mountain goat – then land on a wet one or get some mud on your foot. Next thing you’ve slipped into the drink or brained yourself on a rock.
Amounts to the same thing; you end up fish food.
When I was a kid I had no idea of Paddy’s Island or what happened here when the Old People tried to escape massacre over there by frantically swimming across this stretch of river.
Now I do.
The place doesn’t scare me but, by Christ, I know that the place deserves respect and constant attention while you are here.
If that is the shades of all those murdered Aboriginals tweaking away at the sub-conscious level – they are doing us a favour.
Leastways they ain’t playing foul with the sunsets.”

“You believe that Arthur?”
“Oh yes.”

“Arthur; why does Django reckon you are ‘a bit of a Gonzo’?”
“Gonzo, eh. Probably because I call him a ‘Nazi straight arrow’ whenever I want to wind him up.
He’s not of course, but by the living Harry, it winds his rubber band over snapping point every time without fail.
If Django had taken you here and noticed that trawler driver the entire focus of his account would be all about the stupidity and arrogance of redneck trawler drivers.
It would never have occurred to him to merely mention that the incident happened and leave the reader to work out the link between redneck behaviour in 2011 and bloody massacre in 1850.
In other words let them work out for themselves that, attitude-wise,  diddly squat has changed around this part of the world.
Even if he did cotton on to that he’d still be moaning about lost tourist opportunity or whatever.
 After all, didn’t those blacks spear that famous explorer, Gregory Blaxland’s son, a week before the mass murder here?
Come on Millie, climb aboard. Before it gets dark I’ll show you the famous ‘Kanaka walls’ – stone walls built with slave labour, the old sugar mill where Kanaka slaves were buried under palm trees beside the approach roads.
We’ll even go past ‘The Oaks’, where apparently Blaxland’s dad started to get even with the tribe.”

“It’ll all look boring and regular because if there’s one thing we’re good at doing here it’s burying our history under a veneer of respectability.”

Further reading -
http://ps3beta.com/story/12950  - Paddy’s Island massacre
http://confederate.com/motorcycles/existentialist/  - Millie’s scooter, on the left

                       Please read carefully. Hunter S. may offend

Friday, May 27, 2011

“A CHANGE OF PACE” or A HAT FOR THE OCCASION

Categories – Militaria – Headgear – Headwear – Hardware – History – Alternative History – Pickelhaub – cigarettes - German Soldiers – Lucky Franz – Unteroffizier Lincke – Feldwebel Gross – General Georg von der Marwitz - Australian Soldier – Lance Corporal John Golightly – Sir John Monash –
Provenance – fraud – misrepresentation – misappropriation - hearsay - make the evidence fit the crime – everyone does it these days – if there’s money in it - why not run with the play – Finckel of Rastenburg – accoutrements, de rigeur

Author – Django Reinhardt, Editor

Sometimes you can search and search and never do any good.
What is a collector’s hat worth?
The average WWI  German spiked leather helmet (Pickelhaub) in good condition is ‘offered’ on the net at prices ranging from a large dent in your pocketbook way up to a small fortune.
It seems the price varies considerably with the rarity of the object and whoever the hell is selling it.
There are a few specialised dealers and there are a very few very specialised dealers (usually British) who can command prices that would bankrupt small nations.

Image – Pickelhaub Modell 1915. A Prussian sleeper, apparently a private purchase going by the gilt furniture and Prussian badge, overall quality, diminutive head size, the additional inner crown straps/head support and the lack of regimental markings.
This leather helmet does indeed have what appears to be plug repairs of about rifle calibre (303?) size in the crown though one at the front is behind the undamaged Prussian helmet plate.
How that happened , nobody alive today could possibly know; though it always pays to remember that truth is always stranger than fiction.

Then there is the literature. A symbiotic industry has sprung up beside the collector’s market.
Specialist authors and publishers not only get their rocks off churning out endless numbers of very expensive superbly illustrated books jam packed with pikkies of all manner of ultra rare collector’s items that the average Joe can only dream about – but the sadistic beggars also manage to disclude any mention of your pride and joy from that one thousand picky, full colour epic they’ve just sold you.

And collectors belieeeve these books.
If it ain’t in the book then it don’t exist, is made up of leftover parts, or is counterfeit.
Unless of course, it has ‘provenance’.

Now, provenance these days is a thriving industry.
A ‘consultant’s deed of authenticity is good but usually costs more than the item being flogged off.

Photographs are useful but increasingly doubtful in the age of computer graphics.
Paperwork is great and as far as militaria goes, the odd bloodstain not only impresses but helps cover typos.

Something like –

“To whom this may concern –
Trusting you will have many years satisfaction from my hat.
I bought my Modell 15 Cadet’s/Underofficer’s, private purchase pickelhaub from Herr Otto Finckel, gentleman’s outfitters of Rastenburg in March, 1917.
Please note that it is of a rather small head size since I was not very old when I signed up for the Prussian Infantry (73 Fusiliers) before I was conscripted.
Vati was assured that by volunteering I would have a depot job, as they say, ‘for the duration’, which is why my pickelhaub was a private purchase with gilt fittings  all de rigeur as to my regimental status.

As it happened that proved not to be true and suddenly I was transferred to a quiet spot on the front near a place called LeHamel and arrived there on 1 July just in time for a party.
Unfortunately for me some very aggressive Australians crashed the party and that is why my pickelhaub has these .303 sized holes through it, front and back, only slightly off centre.

Please be assured that I was not in the least impressed, what with not even having time to pay my respects to Uncle Georg.
As it proves, Feldwebel Gross had it right when he told me in no uncertain terms that the shiny gilt finish on my ‘haub would ‘draw the crabs’.

Gruss Gott –
Franz Lincke Uffz. KHq, 73 Pr/Fus
PS – I have had this letter prepared on the off chance that my expensive custom battle bowler having fallen into enemy hands, may float about for a century or so, after turning up on some far away foreign shore and be sold for a packet in the 21st century.
I realised this even as I took my shiny new possession out of its box and thought – ‘now, this needs provenance’.
But as it happened that hung over Aussie retrieved my ‘haub next morning. I helped him patch it and ‘im ein augenblick’ swapped him this letter of provenance for a packet of ‘coffin nails’.
PPS – I had best mention before the new owner gets turned off that I was not wearing my shiny hat when it was shot by that Aussie.
Far from it. He captured me, took a ‘shine’ to it and as they say, ‘pinched’ it, to my disgust. Then he got drunk and used it for sighting his rifle.
Oh, before I forget, the bloodstain on this letter. Cut myself shaving.”

So there you have it, ‘provenance’ of a sort.
I could have it translated into German and handwritten in faux gothic script with diluted Indian ink on a scrap of old paper.
A few dribbles off a meat tray, the careful use of a micro-wave oven and a few judicious waves with a hot air gun would have it looking more genuine than any original.

Is that what the flash dudes in those glittering emporiums mean when they say the things they do to the ‘Right Customer’ in order to sucker a few more thousand out of them for someone else’s second hand trash?

In far too many cases – yes.
But if that sort of thing happens with antiques and militaria, used cars and just about every field there is – then how come it doesn’t happen in politics and the professions too.

What makes them exempt from the temptation to gull people?
And once a person has been gulled and ripped-off – isn’t it always the temptation for them to play along and not expose the fraud in the hope that they can recoup their loss by selling on their mistake to another innocent punter?

Isn’t that the way of the world?
Isn’t that politic?
In fact hasn’t that been politics through the ages?

And now they want you to pay a tax on hot carbonated air?
Oh don’t worry, like that funny hat, the co2 exists.
It’s just that in exactly the same way as the hat; the truth is unknown about the co2 and while people choose to invent stories plausible enough to the gullible – the bullshit will replace the truth for every customer thereafter.

It will not be carbon being traded but the false provenance tacked on to the package for no other purpose than to fraudulently create an inflated and escalating price.

They know this now but as I said – they’ve been gulled – now they’ll be ‘politic’.

Thursday, May 26, 2011

“SHE FELL THROUGH THE CRACK of JURISDICTION”

Guest Author – Ms. Millicent FFulke-Hope BD BEng

Inge kindly invited me to spend a few days with her after meeting again at that awful conference in Melbourne.
A wonderfully restful break from city living but at a cost.
Dear ‘Calligula’ has press-ganged me into writing this paper with a little help from the team.
I pray that the reader will appreciate being able to easily ‘Google’ the reference material.
So much easier to research now, than in my day.

Rights, as opposed to privilege -
Has anyone out there worked out yet that this country does not have a charter of rights?
Even the Greens are concerned - http://greens.org.au/node/5688

Meanwhile various state and federal regimes, these recent decades, have emasculated the authority of the judiciary by secretly, perniciously, arbitrarily, systematically, incrementally, signing away the rule of law, consequently subsuming common law to statute law/ civil code.
Were the adversarial system, judge made law, precedent, and trial before jury, abolished by common consent then something would have to be waiting in the wings to replace it.
That thing would, of necessity, need be acceptable to the international community.

And since the Federal Government has upon its own decision refused to offer the Australian people any form of Charter of Rights that replacement cannot be an inquisitorial system based on Roman law/Napoleonic Code; since, without a document defining citizens rights, such a statutory code has no purchase upon legal nonentities or living chattels.
Such, consequently, becomes a blunt instrument of oppression.

As Arthur has so ably hinted recently, Australian governments risk hubris by precipitately and fallaciously assuming the divine right of kings.
His conviction that the ‘Rafferty’s Rules bodged together by the ‘masters’’ (as he describes that  poorly, often hastily conceived, pastiche of ad-hoc statutes and regulation) has destroyed whatever of the rule of law ever existed, is supportable.

When no one argues the toss or begs to differ with these ‘masters’ they might as well run with it and accept their lot as peon subjects of an authoritarian regime..

‘Justice reform, statute law’, Australian style –
Take a thing, an act or circumstance – something that has been a self-evident feature of society since time immemorial and wrap a law around it.
Australian legislators seem to enjoy doing things like that.
Australians, to their detriment, mistakenly and carelessly tend to laugh it off as ‘make-work’.
Once the new law has been enacted, gazetted and commenced being enforced the complaints, lobbying, breaches and appeals start rolling in.

Situations soon emerge that cannot adequately be dealt with at law.
A judge may be constrained by the relevant statute, subsidiary legislation, some regulation; or may simply decide that his best escape from an impossible ethical situation would be to declare that any ruling on his part could further injure the cause of the appellant.

An Australian, politically appointed judge, emasculated by statute, is ironically statutority immune from consequence of his behaviour in his court.
There are some things that are self evident and there are some things that are Kafka-esque.

This judicial situation is both self-evident and Kafka-esque, yet there are more than enough apologists to perpetuate the absurdity.

The judge can’t help, who or what can?
At some stage in proceedings the legislators may become aware that interpretation of their new law has produced some unforeseen adverse consequences.

If those consequences happen to impinge upon the comfort zones of ‘certain’ individuals or entities presumed of importance some ‘legislative review committee’ is called into play and a series of patchwork amendments and exemptions are mooted, then expeditiously introduced.
Though such mechanisms exist to deal with such contingencies they appear to lack the ‘jurisdiction’ to deal with the legitimate concerns of, or detriment caused to, ordinary citizens.

Politicians are proud of their importance. Rarely is useless legislation rescinded.
It requires no stretch of the imagination to realise why many Queenslanders refer to their fund of legislation as the ‘Lace Doily Laws’, (ie, seems attractive at first, but useless other than at covering things up and full of holes – DR, Editor) .

Much in the way of legislative statute and regulation in Australia has been achieved unlawfully, without consultation or plebescite, without introducing any fund of statutes establishing specific rights for Australian citizens or affording the means of determining jurisdiction whether statutory or within what little remains of the ‘common law justice system’.
See - http://www.umcinc.com.au/index.php?page=anti-biker-laws-human-rights – and please note the list of learned gentlemen supporting the presentation.

Money and its place at law -
It seems that the common law remains available only for the un-commonly wealthy as simultaneously the common Australian is subject to the threat of a series of  arbitrarily summary hearings more reminiscent of  a drumhead court martial than any Court of law.
The Court of Star Chamber would pass unremarked in a modern Australian courthouse.

Such compromise might well matter little for the civil litigant already confronted with the outrageously prohibitive cost of legal advice combined with the diversity and uncertainty of jurisdiction.

The cracks of adversity -
You hear them on the news more often every day – ‘Oh how unfortunate – he/she just fell through the cracks of jurisdiction. Tee hee, never mind’ - and on to the next item of entertainment.
(This is remarkable. I’ve spent quite some time ‘Googling’ Australian sites using key words such as cross jurisdiction, ‘fell through the cracks’ and the like. The first attempt produced a bewildering array of focus and special interest groups subsequently presenting as so constricted in outlook as to be worthless. It is as if the Howard regime has bred a nation of self-centred anal retentives. MFH, author)

It may well be of little concern for the average person to become peripherally aware that disadvantaged and disenfranchised societal outcasts are ‘falling’ through this, that, or the other of the numerous cracks in the carapace of governance.

A sensible person might take pause to question why, in an increasingly regulated system of governance, these ‘cracks’ seem to be spreading.
It might be worthwhile for that person to consider whether some species of ‘fatter cat’, despite his girth, might not be able to ‘slip’ between these same ‘cracks’ with the aid of a spot of lubricious assistance. (Too oblique for you? The lady means a solid wad of money and a good, dishonest barrister. – DR – Editor)

The societal effect -
 “Who the hell thinks they could stuff people about like that at the stroke of a pen.” – or so say all those who go out meekly and uncomplainingly pay their bogus speeding fines.

The slow, remorseless chewing away of once inalienable rights and the spitting out of the base residue (erroneously labeled privileges) was once likened to the action of Tiberius’ jaws.

To explain that may I once again rely upon one of Arthur’s leavening comments -
“Of course the vast majority of these downtrodden little twerps would thank the bloody police for tasering them instead of shooting them stone dead in the unfortunate circumstance of some over-hasty error of mistaken identity.” – which Arthur insists is frequently the sort of sentiment reflecting the value judgments of those becoming increasingly impatient with apparent ‘dystopia’.

The ratchet effect of social engineering
See - http://www.law.uchicago.edu/files/files/350.pdf  - a useful paper ably demonstrating a theme true to my heart.
This one - http://bernardharcourt.com/documents/readers-companion.pdf  - more or less the same document – which will help illustrate how meretricious academics are absorbed with gaining publicity and seeking funding while simultaneously filling legislator’s heads with loads of fantastically disputative ‘bullshine’.
Manipulating pseudo-science toward a ‘profitable’ and pre-determined outcome is, in my opinion, unconscionable.

Before I say more here I will have it known that I first coined the phrase ‘Ratchet Effect’ at an ethics conference in 1978.
I proposed it as a term encompassing all those negative elements cleverly being integrated into processes of governance.

Indeed it was the steady click, click, of my ex-husband, Monty’s ratchet wrench that gave me the inspiration as he worked on his little MG on Sunday morning.
Most remarkable was the way it so often clicked its handle and his knuckles into a corner that made it so difficult for him to remove from the bolt he’d just tightened.
That and the way it often slipped its ratchet, inevitably slamming those same knuckles into some sharp, oily projection under the bonnet.

The blood, tears, curses, threats and imprecations inspired me to realise his response to hurt was the inevitable result of his refusal to choose a better tool for the task.
So much like politicians, I thought.
Charge in bull-at-a-gate, going about things as fast as possible, knowing the process is flawed and blaming everyone else when you go wrong.
Hence the ‘Ratchet Effect©’.

Inspiration, indeed and adequately, microcosmically, describes the futility of encumbering civil society with excessive, unnecessary ‘ratchet legislation’.

Conclusion -
“Any arch-libertarian or latter-day anarchist would wonder why anyone would waste time drafting the bloody obvious in the forlorn hope of advising morons.” – fairly expresses the sentiments of those who asked me to contribute this paper.

Nonetheless, they asked me kindly so here it is by way of begging Australians and especially Queenslanders to ‘grasp the nettle’ and assume some mantle of self-determination.
In closing, If time permits I shall determine to collaborate with dear Calligula and, perhaps, Arthur to compile an article about the eternal dialectic.

The ‘Eutectic Dialectic’ might focus the direction.


Speaking about falling through cracks – some do manage better than others.

Monday, May 23, 2011

“The Ban The Party, Party” - or - “Ho-hum, yet another party”

Author – Inge Lady Friday

The announcement was made today about something we are going to get whether we want it or not.
What; a new public holiday in the latter part of the year?

No; just another political party.

They haven’t decided what to call it yet but apparently they do already have an office at Noia’s wholesale guns in Brizvegas.
If these preliminary reports are correct there ain’t no way that Mr Bob Katter’s new party headquarters will suffer any of those annoying pre-election break-ins; not with the amount of security around that piece of real estate.

Regarding Nioas -
I’m not criticizing guns at all. Nor Nioas.
If anyone thinks I’m going to provide an anti-gun tirade they can quit reading now and find a tatting web-page.

I’m very fond of my Steyr M95 in 8x56R, (Boy, you should see what it does to clangers) but that Nioa mob can’t supply me the right ammo for it, let alone brass or pills. (Anyone else out there own Steyr M95s ? We could set up an owners club. DR - Editor)
The point I do make about Nioa’s is that the facility is built like Fort Knox

On the face of it Anna should be annoyed.
She might have to introduce overnight legislation that political parties have to operate from vulnerable premises.
But hang on, that wouldn’t work; not unless the laborites had an exemption.
Ooohhhh what the hell – he’ll screw up the conservatives the same way that Hanson woman did a few years ago.
‘Brilliant’, she thinks as she nips into little Andy’s office to talk the treasurer into cutting a cheque and sending Bob a handsome start-up donation.

Oh yes, I wouldn’t mind betting she’d do something like that because the last thing the conservatives and that eighty percent of the Queensland population want right now is a divided anti-laborite vote.

Most Queenslanders don’t particularly want a conservative government.
What they want is an end to the laborites so decisively achieved that the present mob will be either still in prison, ‘in-care’, or deceased before labor ever looks like another chance.
And the only way they’ll get that is by not voting labor.

It isn’t the ‘take it or leave it’ Hobson’s choice found in certain countries – but is the nearest damned thing.
Bob Katter has been around long enough to know all about that so what the hell is he up to?

Curbing ‘Can-Do Newman might be a good bet.
Returning ‘empowerment’ to the regions might sound plausible but he’d still have to form a coalition with that entrenched sub-set we now call the opposition who, apparently, are as compromised as the present laborite regime.
It is all too baffling, nevertheless we have a fair idea where it will lead.

In consequence we’ve decided to establish the “Ban The Party Party”™.
The concept is simple.
Firstly, we announce the start-up here by calling for all interested people to send us messages of support and any emoluments you may wish to offer.
Once we have the ball rolling we’ll call for membership and register the party.
All that usual sort of thing.

Our first ballot should be a winner and with a parliamentary majority we shall call parliament together on the first day’s business and vote to BAN all political parties for all time in the state of Queensland. ( Hey, if they could do that to the Legislative Council back in 1922 we can do it to these rotten parties in 2012.)

The “Ban the Parties Act, Qld – 2012” shall contain subsidiary legislation requiring parliamentarians to abide by statutory standards of conduct, ethics, accountability and decency – primarily they shall be required to serve their electorate and the people of Queensland – and at their peril should they fail so to do. (Breach 5.000,000 penalty points)

As soon as possible after that time all monies not already spent that were donated to the now deceased political parties shall be returned to the respective donors.

It might take a bit of tweaking, but by golly – wouldn’t that set the cat amongst the pigeons.

Sunday, May 22, 2011

“So now they want to confiscate the proceeds of idealism, honesty and decency”

Author – Calligula

As I start this I’m listening to David Hicks on the radio at our famous, influential and acclaimed, Sydney Writer’s Festival.
Any speaker there shall be heard and noticed.
His was well beyond any Andy Warhol tour de force.
His ‘moment’ before a packed house was superbly accomplished and well deserved.
The well deserved salute for his dad damned near brought the roof down.

I’ve already read his book months ago thanks to the local Library.
What an amazingly brave man is Dave Hicks!

But our government (yeck) in their wisdom have decided to determine whether the income from his book should be confiscated as ‘proceeds of crime’.
(Didn’t J.W. Howard, then pm, make a proclamation that Hicks was guilty of NO CRIME. Whatsoever. Twisted bludger would probably put it that way – DR – editor)

They definitely have their finger on the collective pulse – that lot.


Might it be possible to set up a collection of some sort?
Some way of sidestepping these bastards in the same way they keep sidestepping the interests of everyday Australians.
If we set up a formal trust fund in the event of the common-wealth (get that, commonwealth) stealing Dave’s hard earned income, the shiteheels’d probably pass a law next day banning trust funds out of existence.

What ?
Am I serious that our masters would just throw away those cosy, opaque little family arrangements they’ve customarily exploited from time immemorial to launder and disperse their bribes and extra-curricular income?
Do that just to make sure that Dave Hicks is denied a few bucks from his book sales?

So whoever said they were bright.
Why wouldn’t they?
These days they act desperate enough.

Oh for god’s sake – work it out for yourself, but while you’re doing that consider all the other stupid, crossgrained games they’ve been playing lately.

Meanwhile can we set up that pathway of sending Dave gifts.
Every one of us who has read his book could send him a small gift in the mail.
Two South Pacific Pesos or a thousand, a million – depending on what we decide we can afford.

If we did that would our masters ban gift-giving?

Wouldn’t surprise me in the slightest – not the way they’ve been acting lately.
So what say you Australians.
Do we set up a gift fund for Dave if the present crop of federales continue with compounding Howard’s and Dubya’s crimes?

Maybe if we put enough into the kitty we could set up a movement and nominate Dave for the first President?

Part 5 - “PIGS GO NATIONAL” – or – Courts of intentional cross-jurisdiction need answer neither to man nor god.

Categories – Disbelief – disenchantment – disgust – Dishonour – Disrepute – Disrespect – distrust – dissolution – disclosure, or disinformation?.

Author – Arthur

Is there a word for it?
Some way of conveying the frustration to someone out there who might listen.
I’ve this minute finished listening to Rob Messenger speaking on ABC radio about his fight for the truth about entrenched corruption in Qgov, their pet CMC and hell, west and crooked.

Mr. Messenger chose to speak over the national broadcaster the same day the ‘One Nation’ political party was knocked back yet again by the qld electoral commission.

Mr Messenger is the independent member for Burnett in the state of Queensland and reckons he’s having a tough time in his role as fighter for justice and right.
Leaving aside that some find his fights somewhat selective and self-promoting he may have a point that gaining airtime can sometimes be difficult.

Why?

I have the impression that the propaganda machine is working well.
What is prime news ‘here’ in this region doesn’t get a mention ‘there, elsewhere’.

Of course the news media these days are under immense pressure to self-censor their output but sometimes it goes beyond a joke.

These dudes reckon the press has standards - http://www.presscouncil.org.au/pcsite/fop/charter.html
- but unfortunately the press council has to admit their people have no actual rights except, ultimately, to argue the toss at immense cost in a court of law if someone objects to what they’ve written.
Don’t believe me? Find out for yourself.
Phone - (1800) 02 5712 or find them here - http://www.presscouncil.org.au/pcsite/contact.html
Sam Griffith made sure there was a defence under the queensland criminal code if any statement was substantially correct but that doesn’t matter much wherever judges can be bought.

Considering that, it isn’t surprising that some poor journo isn’t going to utter anything against his boss’s wishes in anything she writes – especially when the boss is the same government that refuses to countenance adopting dedicated human rights legislation.

Then again I suppose it depends whether journalists these days consider themselves as objective, unbiased reporters of fact or are merely employed as low grade entertainers and purveyors of specious pap.

How does this operate in Queensland?
To find out I phoned the ABC – about the ‘One Nation’ situation post their radio interview and about a ‘lockdown’ of Brisbane’s Central Railway Station yesterday evening.

Why annoy the ABC?
Coincidentally, the gent who interviewed ‘One Nation’ the other day also announced over the airwaves yesterday evening, according to numerous ‘Tweets’ sent to him, that , for reasons unknown, police had isolated Brisbane’s major rail facility at peak hour.

(STOP PRESS – One source, repeat, only one source has reported this incident, ‘Brisbane Times’ – see link below.)

Neither event is exactly earthshattering in the grand scheme of things but  nonetheless newsworthy – leastways for that single disgruntled ‘One Nation’ member who wanted to know why he couldn’t catch his #+%*$! train home from work yesterday.

Two hours have passed and I’m still waiting for my return call from that talking head at the ABC.
Surely he’s going to return that promised call – or is he in ‘lockdown’ himself this afternoon?
Maybe he blotted his copybook by not asking first whether he should mention ‘One Nation’ and ‘what the police are up to’?

But I didn’t phone the ABC to give him a rev.
After all, he was the bloke who was decent and ethical enough to put out the information in the first place.
Without his good service I wouldn’t have known that One Nation was putting in its application to be re-registered as a full-house political party.

What I want to know is why the Qld branch of the Australian Electoral Commission™ dishonestly knocked them back.
I want to know why that ‘rejection-out-of-hand’ (sound familiar?)has not exactly been covered by the press.

The same thing applies to the other event.
In democracies the sudden and unannounced closure of a major public transport facility usually attracts attention and if some reasonable justification cannot be provided after the inevitable press attention results in censure or at least embarrassment for the relevant administration.

But not in Queensland, eh?

Post Script -
So I gave up waiting and phoned back the ABC. This time our radio journo answered himself.
He was unaware that One Nation had been knocked back by the Qld electoral commission but promised to chase it up.
Maybe he should read this - http://www.onenation.com.au/media.htm .
As far as lockdown at Brisbane Central Railway Station – indeed, according to his tweets it was a full-house police operation evacuating the place.
Yet  the people at ABC have heard nothing about that incident through their usual news channels.

Queensland is indeed becoming an increasingly lawless place and it isn’t the inmates breaking the law.

Arthur interviews the proprietor of PRS Defence

Arthur So what do you think of them apples, Chief?
P – “Just keeps getting more interesting every day.
Someone once said something along the lines of ’You don’t notice the barbed wire going up until it’s too late’.
The last few years I’d believed it was all about stupid vindictive people in an overly competitive business playing bastard up close and personal games with us.”

ArthurYou mean the government condoned home invasions, theft of assets and intellectual property, all the sort of things those bastards reckon are legal for them?
P – “Yeah. Things like that are clearly okay in queensland.
Must be. They certainly did the number on us in the royal fashion.
But that was in private, if you understand, in the privacy of my home and workplace. They even made sure they were in private when I tried to take the scum to court.
Did you know that Arthur? Court is supposed to be a public place and the free press is supposed to be out there ready, waiting and primed to publish that sort of thing in the public AND national interest.”

Arthur Right, I’m with you. Now they (the masters) are confident enough to get up to their vicious little games right out there in the face of the public. Are the people scared or is it that they just don’t give a stuff, so long as the hate is happening to someone else?
That’s what you mean, isn’t it?
P – “That’s the shot.
Bertrand Russell said – “Most people would rather die than think; in fact they do!”
I heard that one on the radio just a minute ago and on the strength of that, googled these after ward.
‘The greatest challenge to any thinker is stating the problem in a way that allows a solution.’
And – ‘In all affairs it’s a healthy thing to hang a question mark on the things you have long taken for granted.’
By the way, Arthur, a bit of a stop press moment here Dave Hicks is speaking later; by radio from the writer’s festival. I heard on a news bulletin that the feds are trying to confiscate his income from his book as the ‘proceeds of crime’. Now, how stuffed is that?
Hey, did the Russians rip off Aleksandr Solzhenitzyn for writing the ‘Gulag Archipelago’?
Has Dave ever committed a crime in Australia?
What’s to bet that they’ll (the ABC) have yet another ‘unforeseen break in transmission’ just after he gets warmed up.”

Arthur – You want me to put good money down against a sure thing?
Get lost!
Anyway, I take your point; try to put an article together about injustice and autocratic, bureaucratic insanity and the stupid bastards flood the environment, Can’t get ahead of the pricks.
Where were we; Bertie Russell, wasn’t it?
P – “Right. That first quote stands alone: after all, who are we to argue with Bertrand Russell, especially when we agree with him. What!
‘Stating the problem in a way that allows for a solution’ is a little more knotty.
Is the problem to do with the sordid acts of this dystopia being rammed down our necks or the remarkably adaptable gullets of the silent majority; so many of whom seem quite prepared to do the cormorant to each and every stinking fish thrown their way?
As to the question mark over things taken for granted?
Tell you what, Arthur, let’s ask Winston Churchill.”

Arthur – WHAT?
P – Why not. No bastard listens to us ‘cos we’re too radical and nonsensical.
So why not present them with some sage advice from a right old Arch-Conservative?
Here, take this – “If you have ten thousand regulations, you destroy all respect for the law.”
And – “You have enemies? Good. That means you have stood up for something, sometime in your life.”
Then - “The farther backward you can look, the further forward you are likely to see.”
Last but not least – “If you will not fight for right when you can easily win without blood shed; if you will not fight when your victory is sure and not too costly; you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a precarious chance of survival. There may even be a worse case. You may have to fight when there is no hope of victory, because it is better to perish than to live as slaves.”


Further reading -

http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollbludger/2011/05/18/newspoll-60-40-to-lnp-in-queensland/ popular, aren’t they? Why would one nation be being stuffed about again?
http://goldcoast.iprime.com.au/index.php/news/national-news/commissioner-backs-staff-in-hanson-row the public service is allowed to exercise prejudice and act vindictively?


http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2011/05/22/3223519.htm