Archive for December 2005
Jap pirates and the good pirates of the Southern Ocean
Paul Watson, captain of the “Farley Mowat”, which is chasing the Japanese whaling fleet in the Southern Ocean, writes a piece in The Age The good pirates of the Southern Ocean
The whole article is worth reading. A few quotes”
“The Southern Ocean, specifically the area formally known as the Australian
Antarctic Territory, now rivals the 17th-century Caribbean for the reported acts
of piracy during the past two weeks.
The Japanese whalers are accusing Sea Shepherd and Greenpeace crew members of being pirates. Sea Shepherd and Greenpeace are accusing the whalers of being pirates.”
“There are pirates of profit like the Japanese, pirates of opportunity like the
politicians, and pirates of compassion like Sea Shepherd.
It is a little difficult to cast Sea Shepherd unpaid volunteers selflessly and legally trying to save the lives of whales as ruthless pirates. On the other hand, the Japanese whalers are illegally stealing and killing whales from a sanctuary for whales and from the territory that is supposed to be under the authority of Australia.
Which brings us to the motivation of those pirates in Canberra. What is in it for them that they consistently refuse to protect Australian territory from illegal foreign exploitation.
The answer is the same for Australian politicians today as it was for British politicians in 1650 – there’s money to be made, under the table and through the back door, trade agreements to consider, and, after all, some pirates, especially the Japanese, have good public relations firms and powerful financial backing.”
George’s best Bushisms
AN ill-timed endorsement of the now-disgraced former head of the agency responsible for the Hurricane Katrina relief effort has won a popular vote of US President George W. Bush’s “Bush-isms” for 2005.
Call it the wrong phrase at the wrong time but “Brownie, you’re doing a heckuva job” was named President Bush’s most memorable phrase of 2005.
The ill-timed praise of a now disgraced agency head became a national punch line for countless jokes and pointed comments about the administration’s handling of the Hurricane Katrina disaster and added to the president’s reputation for verbal gaffes and clumsy turns of phrase.
Paul Payack of Global Language Monitor, which tracks language use, said Mr Bush’s statement in support of the then-director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency may be remembered for years to come.
“The ‘Brownie’ quote leads our 2005 list of Bushisms, memorable phrases or new words coined by the president,” Mr Payack said, adding that President Bush may be the foremost White House creator of new words, citing such past efforts as “misunderestimate” (to seriously underestimate) and “embetter” (to make emotionally better).
Ten days after Mr Bush verbally patted Michael Brown on the back before the TV cameras, Brown resigned amid a public uproar over his qualifications and the administration’s failure to get aid to New Orleans after the devastation of Hurricane Katrina.
Although the President did not originate any new words this year, he had several notable statements, Mr Payack said, citing the following:
“See, in my line of work you got to keep repeating things over and over and over again for the truth to sink in, to kind of catapult the propaganda,” Bush said in explaining his communications strategy last May.
“I think I may need a bathroom break. Is this possible?” Bush asked in a note to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice during a U.N. Security Council meeting in September.
“This notion that the United States is getting ready to attack Iran is simply ridiculous. And having said that, all options are on the table,” Bush said in Brussels last February.
“In terms of timetables, as quickly as possible – whatever that means,” the president said of his timeframe for passing Social Security legislation in March.
“Those who enter the country illegally violate the law,” Bush said in describing illegal immigrants in Tucson, Arizona, last month.
Naked lap-dancing driver pulled over by police.
A New Zealand woman carried the spirit of Christmas giving too far when she sat on her boyfriend’s lap while he drove their car at 2.30am yesterday, police say.
A police officer who stopped them in the South Island town of Nelson found the couple ‘in a state of undress’ although the woman was back in the passenger seat by the time he walked up to talk to them.
Asked why they were driving like that, the 20-year-old woman said: ‘Come on officer, it’s Christmas – a time for giving,’ Sergeant Shane Miles told the Nelson Mail.
The officer was not amused.
Dubbing it an ‘incredibly stupid and potentially dangerous thing to do’, he charged the 21-year-old man with careless driving and fined the girlfriend for not wearing a seat belt.
DPA”
Peace and goodwill to all, except Tom Cruise
Amusing wishlist of things to happen and not happen in 2006, byt the SMH’s heckler:
Peace and goodwill to all, except Tom Cruise
By Eleanor Learmonth
December 30, 2005
A wise man once said it took 42 muscles to frown and only four to pull the trigger of a decent sniper rifle. How profound. A select few things in 2005 really had my finger twitching. Here’s praying we can get through 2006 without the following:
1. Any individual who is going on a “journey”. This should include a long journey, an emotional journey, a rewarding journey and especially an amazing journey. I advocate anyone going on a journey should have their destination re-routed off the nearest high cliff.
2. Paris Hilton, her gormless boyfriends, her shrivelled dog or her pet monkey.
3. Hearing Tom Cruise’s advice on childbirth. In fact, hearing anything about Tom Cruise – except that he’s died after falling off furniture while cavorting around like a chimp on crack. I wouldn’t mind hearing that.
4. Any TV show in which the script relies heavily on the word evict.
5. Children’s books written by celebrities on the grounds that they once actually saw a child who had accidentally wandered into business class.
6. Skanky hos as feminist role models. Generally speaking, if you’re dressed like you’re going to fight for the working rights to the local street corner, you’re not role model material.
7. Mark Latham.
8. Books which have the word “dark” in the title, or the name “Dan” on the front cover.
9. Designer dogs with breed names that rhyme with strudel.
10. Food in restaurants with jus all over it.
11. Kyle what’s-his-name, who seems to have become famous solely due to his head’s resemblance to a well-sucked mango.
12. Offspring of the rich and famous whose names are destined to send them into early therapy. As in: “Cinnamon! You’ve left the #*@* door open and the #*@!# paparazzi have got in again.”
13. Offspring of the less-well-off whose names need a footnote to spell correctly. As in: “Shantelle, stop pulling Kodie’s hair and share those cigarettes.”
14. Politicians applying the phrase “user pays” to health care, transport or education. Isn’t that why we pay taxes?
15. Lebanese jokes. Really, they’re just not funny.
16. Any American in a shiny suit pretending that intelligent design isn’t just a rebadged version of creationism.
17. The word rebadged.
18. TV commercials featuring singing animals, usually zebras, who are incapable of rhyming “indeedy” with anything better than “seedy”.
And in conclusion, here are three things I’d really love to see in 2006:
1. More off-the-cuff comments by George Bush. Seriously, we could all do with more laughter in our lives.
2. A Chinese Government spokesman interrupting his tirade on Japanese war guilt to say: “Oh, hang on, I’ve just remembered about Tibet.”
3. Brightly coloured wristbands that say: “Make Bono History.”
Readers are invited to apply wit to anything that makes the blood boil. Send 600 words, with day and evening phone numbers, to heckler@smh.com.au. Submissions may be edited and published on the internet.”
British woman weds dolphin – World – smh.com.au
Wierd.
British tourist Sharon Tendler has finally made her dream match – by ‘marrying’ a dolphin she has been visiting for 15 years in the Israeli resort of Eilat, the mass-circulation Yediot Ahronot daily reported.
Tendler, 41, has been visiting the city on the Gulf of Aqaba two or three times a year to spend time with her 35-year-old underwater sweetheart.
‘The peace and tranquility under water, and his love, would calm me down,’ the Israeli daily quoted her as saying.
Last week Tendler finally plucked up the courage to ask the dolphin’s trainer for the mammal’s fin in marriage.
The wedding took place Wednesday, with the bride, wearing a white dress and watched by amazed spectators, walking down the dock to where the groom was waiting in the water.
She kissed him, to the cheers of the spectators and then, after the ceremony was sealed with some mackerels, was tossed into the water so she could swim away with her new husband.
‘I’m the happiest girl on earth,’ the bride was quoted as saying.
‘I made a dream come true. And I am not a pervert.’”
What are their kids going to look like? Is that how mermaids are made?
More 4WD rollover fatalities.
AN eight-year-old boy and a 46-year-old woman are dead after a 4WD crash in Tasmania’s north-east. The woman driver and the boy are believed to be related.
Whilst attempting to overtake another vehicle on a straight section of road, the Toyota Rav4 4WD’s tyres went into gravel on the right-hand side of the road. The RAV 4 swerved back onto the left-hand side before rolling several times.
The boy was thrown from the vehicle.
Once again, a classic “Moose Test” 4WD accident scenario – when a 4WD swerves one way and then the other, the chances are very high that it will roll.
Most of the deaths in 4WD’s this Christmas have been caused by this.
Interesting links:
Rollover – The Hidden History of the SUV
NHTSA Rollover Page
The SUV Info Link
Rollover Lawyer site with interesting info
The Physics of SUV Rollover Accidents
Consumers Union SUV Rollover campaign
Another Rollover Lawyer site with useful information and Links
Smartcar Guide, diatribe on SUV’s and Keith Bradsher’s controversial book, High and Mighty: SUV’s – the World’s Most Dangerous Vehicles and How They Got That Way
The Center for Auto Safety – SUV page
US Insurance Institue for Highway Safety (IIHS): Crash Testing & Highway Safety
noSUV.org has excellent list of links
it also sports a great set of stories published in Newspapers
Like this one from which I take an excerpt:
“..the Australian Transport Safety Bureau informs that roll-overs account for one in three fatal SUV crashes, compared to one in eight for passenger cars. And figures just out from Monash University’s Accident Research Centre highlight that the driver of a rolled SUV is almost 50 per cent more likely to be seriously injured than had he rolled a wagon or a sports car or even a small hatchback.
A few days later, in a vast car auction yard in Melbourne’s industrial west, crash analyst Shane Richardson guides me through a sea of vehicles written off by insurers. One section is devoted to SUVs, and, unlike the other cars, most have crumpled roofs.
“If you’re in a car and you get yourself in an awkward position and you give yourself a fistful of steering wheel, your car’s going to spin round and slide sideways,” explains Richardson. “If you do that in your 4WD, it’s very likely you’ll end up on your roof.”
Richardson, a former army engineer completing a PhD in roll-over protection systems, pokes his head through the shattered driver’s window of a LandCruiser to inspect bloodstains on the twisted sunvisor. “This driver wouldn’t be too flash,” he says, bumping his head on the inverted ceiling. “A seatbelt is designed for a frontal collision. In a roll-over you are thrown into the roof as the roof collapses, so you get a diving type of injury to your head or spine, like quadriplegia, from a relatively minor impact. That’s if it doesn’t kill you.”"
Full Story: http://drive.com.au/editorial/article.aspx?id=8730&vf=3&bg=5&pp=2
NSW Police Online – all fatal accidents have been 4WDs
NSW police verify my suspicions:
NSW Police Online | Latest Media Information
27 December 2005
A total of four people have died in three separate crashes on New South Wales roads during the Christmas period.
Overnight, a man died after the Jeep Wrangler 4WD he was driving rolled on Barclays Street, Eden.
Earlier today, a female driver and male passenger died after the Toyota Landcruiser 4WD they were travelling in rolled on the New England Highway near Wallabadah.
Of the four fatalities all the vehicles involved have been 4WDs.“
4WDs common to NSW holiday deaths – National – smh.com.au
I have noted that many of the fatal accidents this Christmas have been 4-wheel-drive off-road vehicles. Perhaps this will raise the issue of these monsters being unsafe?
4WDs common to NSW holiday deaths – smh.com.au
By Natasha Wallace
December 28, 2005
FOUR-wheel-drive vehicles were involved in all three NSW fatal road accidents in which four people died over the Christmas period.
The national holiday road toll rose to 21 yesterday afternoon when a 33-year-old NSW man’s motorcyle slid into the path of an oncoming car on a bend near the Gold Coast.
Early yesterday a woman and one of her six passengers, a teenage male, died after she lost control of a Toyota LandCruiser. The vehicle dropped about four metres off the side of the road near Wallabadah, 50 kilometres west of Tamworth. Two female passengers are critically ill at Tamworth Base Hospital.
A 26-year-old Victorian man was crushed to death on Boxing Day after an open-topped Jeep Wrangler he was driving rolled in Eden, on the South Coast.
On Christmas Day a 12-year-old boy died and four people were injured in the first fatal accident during the Operation Safe Arrival campaign, which began on December 23 and ends at midnight on January 6.
The child died at the scene after the family’s four-wheel-drive ran off the new M7 motorway at Cecil Park, in Sydney’s west.
Why is Bush act like he has to prove something?
More on Britney and Kev
First off, American radio DJ Jason Cage has set up the website divorcekevin.com, urging Britney Spears to dump husband Kevin Federline.
Cage, who is responsible for feedlindsay.com, a site dedicated to thin actress Lindsay Lohan, launched the site as part of an effort to make Spears “remove the boil that is Kevin from herself and her payroll”.
The site sells t-shirts with anti-Federline slogans and lists a host of unflattering details about the back-up dancer, including the fact that he started dating Spears while his ex-girlfriend, Shar Jackson, was pregnant with their second child.
Visitors to the site can play a Britney Bingo game to predict when the couple will split and can even sign a K-Fed Up petition, urging Spears to dump Federline as soon as possible.
The petition has already collected around 10,000 signatures. great website
Ninemsn entertainment news also commented last week on Britney and Kev:
When you’re filthy rich and famous like Britney Spears you don’t need to marry for money. But the nugget of wisdom in this week’s entertainment news is this: wealthy or not, don’t get hitched to someone unemployed who also sports a nickname like The Rat. You would think it goes without saying — that the alarm bells would automatically start ringing (loudly). Alas, not for Britney, who must surely be thinking “Oops, I did it again” when reflecting on her doomed second marriage.
Sick of her husband, Kevin Federline’s partying ways, she finally summoned the courage to kick him out of the house … only to follow him to the swanky Beverly Hills Hotel in Los Angeles where he checked in. Okay, so she’s clearly not a woman of steely resolve. But perhaps the news that her free-loading husband will seek $125 million from her should they split might be just the motivation she needs to ditch him for good.
Kevin claims he still loves Britney, but he isn’t impressed she’s put her foot down.
“It’s days before Christmas, I’m out on the streets and people point the finger and say, ‘Ho, ho, ho, it’s Mr Britney Spears — you must be on a good thing, buddy’. What a joke!” he’s reportedly told friends.
Love her or loathe her, there’s no question Britney has married way beneath her.
