Thursday, August 25, 2005
PAY THE BILL
Tickets to Bill Clinton’s anti-poverty conference, to be held in September, cost $15,000 each.
(Via reader JayL)
FLIGHT OF THE BUSH-HATERS
Just as they’d vowed, thousands of big-mouthed white Americans are fleeing the US for Canada.
(Via Edward Willett)
WOMAN IN NET CAFE DEFIES AUTHORITY
Ex-Fairfax employee Margo Kingston seems not to understand that as a common street blogger she’s obliged to follow certain copyright regulations:
When trying to link to my first piece on Tony from the Webdiary archive I noticed that all of a sudden you have to register to be linked. So if you don’t want to do that, I’ve republished the piece after Tony’s article.
Indeed she does—all 4,622 words of it, lifted without abbreviation from the SMH’s 2002 archive. Meanwhile, The Australian’s Amanda Meade reports on Margo’s abrupt departure:
It was all very mysterious and has created a frenzy in cyberspace as her fans try to work out what has happened and fire questions to the blogger, who is now working from an internet cafe.
Margo prefers a classier description; she’s working from an internet place. Where she’s just put up an item on—brace yourselves—“the takeover of Adelaide by Halliburton”.
PROTOCOL NOT COMPLETELY FORGOTTEN
Aside from this Miranda Devine column, New Zealand’s Kyoto Katastrophe has received little local notice; as well, pundits who once wouldn’t quit talking Kyoto up have lately gone strangely quiet on the subject. Former Labor MP Bob Catley mentions the Forbidden Protocol briefly today:
By signing the rotten Kyoto agreement, Helen Clark’s Government incurred a bill of about a billion dollars.
And they thought they’d actually make money.
CANCEL WAR; CINDY UPSET
Work through the logic of this, posted by Walter Kirn at Sullivan’s place:
Sheehan has every right to her emotion, as far as I’m concerned, since a war that can’t survive a mourning mother shouldn’t be going on at all.
So if the war can survive a mourning mother, then Sheehan loses the right to her emotion? And is that how we measure a war’s sustainability—by the grief of one parent? What if that parent isn’t actually mourning but instead thinks it’s great that her protest demands haven’t been met, allowing her to maintain whatever idiot momentum she’s built thus far?
Wednesday, August 24, 2005
WIDE COMMUNITY APPEAL SOUGHT
John Hewson has got up and walked out:
The former leader of the federal Liberal Party, John Hewson, has left the board of the new web-based political campaign organisation, GetUp! less than a month after its launch …
Dr Hewson’s resignation places the organisation in a difficult position.
The search is now on to find someone who is not aligned with either the Labor Party or the Greens to gain wider community appeal.
Good luck with that. Meanwhile lefty-loaded New Matilda is celebrating the massive success of its first year:
We now have 3192 valued subscribers and we’re well on the way to hitting our target of five thousand by the end of the year.
Congratulations! You’re re-engaging the discouraged, and providing an inter-generational forum for new people with new ideas! Which is why comments at New Matilda have skyrocketed:
It has been the comments that subscribers have added to each article that have given us the most pleasure because it means that our readers have not just passively consumed, they have also been moved to contribute themselves. An article by Hugh Mackay spectacularly generated around 40 comments …
Spectacular? That gigantic comment harvest was generated by only 12 people, three of whom supplied more than half the total. Next they’ll be bragging about receiving spam.
TREADMILL EICHMANNS
Michael Moore’s Florida fat farm flensing is underway:
I am humbly dedicating my stay here to Cindy and Casey, and I vow to emerge a slimmer, stronger, more attractive agitator for Truth. See you in a week!
Sadly, a Bush-linked Cuban conspiracy now threatens Moore’s UnSuperSize Me program. Iowahawk has the full story.
Tuesday, August 23, 2005
VISION OF ABSOLUTE MORAL AUTHORITY
A Mother Sheehan miracle has been removed by eBay:
Online auction site eBay has pulled off the Web an ad for a baseball the seller claimed bore the face of anti-war activist Cindy Sheehan, saying the ball was not properly authenticated.
Looks pretty authentic to me:
INACTIVISTS
We’re into Day 3 of the New Webdiary (unemployment edition) and so far, apart from ridiculous “opening statements” from eleven of its contributors, only one item has been posted. Margo plans to continue this furious workrate:
Once the Club Chaos team work out a structure for the independent Webdiary and move us across to the permanent site I’m gunna take a month off.
A month off from what?
UPDATE. Margo’s former employer isn’t amused:
Fairfax has received a number of complaints from readers about unsolicited emails sent by Margo Kingston or her associates. Fairfax is concerned about this and would like to inform its readers that these emails were not sent by Fairfax, nor authorised by Fairfax. We have taken immediate action to ensure that any personal information of Web Diary readers is properly protected.
While we were not responsible for these emails, Fairfax regrets any inconvenience caused to readers.
How on earth could this have happened? Was it the fault of the transition manager, the comments manager, the official historian, or the achivist? Was there a communications breakdown between Team Beta and Team Gamma?
And how long until the Margo T-shirts are available? Those of us who want to look like Goth puke are becoming impatient.
MULTICULTURAL TOLERANCE AND SENSITIVITY
A day has been selected on which we may consider the prejudice and bias suffered by Islamic Australians:
Islamic youth organisations that were not part of Prime Minister John Howard’s summit yesterday say they have been working against extremism behind the scenes.
They have chosen a date for a planned day of action - September 11.
The group says it wants to try to change the date’s association with extreme Islamic violence, and to highlight how mainstream Muslims have become victims of prejudice and bias.
(Via Florida Cracker)
TEXAN VIGIL MAINTAINED IN LOS ANGELES
Great reporting in the SMH, via the Australian Associated Press:
Sheehan has been maintaining a vigil outside the ranch ...
Make that “had been”. Mother Sheehan hasn’t been at the demonstration since last week.
Bush said that two high-ranking members of his staff have already met with her.
Not mentioned: that Bush had also met with her. Maybe the SMH’s new editor, whenever one is found, will appoint someone to check AAP’s copy before it’s blasted out on the SMH’s site. (Incidentally, I’m aware of two people approached by the SMH for the editor’s job. Both declined.)
UPDATE. Wesley Pruden:
Some of the celebrities descending on Prairie Chapel Ranch owe Cindy Sheehan a lot. How else would we know they weren’t dead?
COLUMN DEMANDS MEETING WITH PRESIDENT
This week’s Continuing Crisis column for The Bulletin mentions Frank Sinatra, two-dollar hookers, Tim Brunero, Vesna Tofevski, Greg and David Mathews, Mother Sheehan, George W. Bush, Alan Ramsey, Robin Gollan, John Howard, Mamdouh Habib, Sandra Sully, Naomi Bartlett, and Garry Linnell. Also in The Bulletin: strange and troubling photographs.
HELP THE CABBIE
Adrian the cabbie sends a note:
Currently cabbies are getting shafted at Sydney airport by hire car drivers illegally touting for fares. As a result many cabbies are refusing to go near the joint. Now the TDA is collecting evidence to force the MOT to act. On which I’ve just posted a request for readers to report on such experiences.
Hasn’t happened to me yet, but if you’ve got an airport taxi tale to tell, drop by Adrian’s site and reveal all.
THANKS, MICK
The Age’s Michael Gawenda—who is usually mentioned here negatively—makes a hopeful point:
Mick Jagger has written and recorded an anti-war song called Sweet Neo Con. Having read the lyrics, it seems unlikely to become the anti-war movement’s anthem.
It is so bad that it might even encourage some of the old veterans of the anti-Vietnam War movement after they hear it, to stop banging on about the lessons of Vietnam. If that happens, Mick Jagger will deserve our thanks.
ABLE DANGER RE-ABLED
The Able Danger story gains another name:
An active-duty Navy captain has become the second military officer to come forward publicly to say that a secret intelligence program tagged the ringleader of the Sept. 11 attacks as a possible terrorist more than a year before the attacks.
The officer, Scott J. Phillpott, said in a statement on Monday that he could not discuss details of the military program, which was called Able Danger, but confirmed that its analysts had identified the Sept. 11 ringleader, Mohamed Atta, by name by early 2000. “My story is consistent,” said Captain Phillpott, who managed the program for the Pentagon’s Special Operations Command. “Atta was identified by Able Danger by January-February of 2000.”
His comments came on the same day that the Pentagon’s chief spokesman, Lawrence Di Rita, told reporters that the Defense Department had been unable to validate the assertions made by an Army intelligence veteran, Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer, and now backed up by Captain Phillpott, about the early identification of Mr. Atta.
More on this from Captain’s Quarters:
Not only did Philpott come forward and confirm that identification, Rep. Weldon also found and named a contractor who created the chart in 2000 that included Atta as an identified potential threat. James Smith recalled the identification because he retained a copy of the chart created for Able Danger ...
And from John at Powerline:
If Mohammed Atta really was in the United States in early 2000, he was traveling under another name—big shock, right?—and the September 11 commission’s carefully constructed timetable under which, among other things, he couldn’t possibly have traveled to Prague to meet with an Iraqi intelligence agent in 2001, is shot to hell.
If the Able Danger story is true, it’s a whole new ball game, in more ways than one. And if I were Jamie Gorelick, I’d be quietly applying for Canadian citizenship.