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SPELLING ERROR ADDRESSES RALLY
The Age’s caption: “Opposition leader Kym Beazley speaks to the crowd.” Bernie Slattery has more on this ‘70s-style Melbourne retro-rally.
UPDATE. A correction, not available online, in today’s Melbourne Age:
The first paragraph of an article on the front page of yesterday’s Business section incorrectly stated the sharemarket was tipped to fall by 50% in the coming year. As the following paragraphs made clear, this should have read “sharemarket returns” would fall, not the market itself. The mistake was made in editing.
Via Tony Thomas, who writes: “One has to wonder about all the Age subs who must have seen the incorrect story predicting the worst depression since 1930, but failed to notice anything wrong. Innumeracy is a serious problem there, as well as the politics.”
UPDATE II. From the Herald Sun:
When Mr Beazley took to the back of the truck near Federation Square, a laconic labourer from Broadmeadows quipped: “Hope the truck’s got good suspension.”
Not really relevant to the spelling error, but on the topic of union opposition to the proposed IR reforms…
My wife is a NSW state high school teacher. Earlier this week, schools received notification from the Dept of Education that the salaries of staff attending today’s stop-work meeting would NOT be docked. Many schools made arrangements for some staff to stay on duty so that children could be supervised. Parents were informed.
When it was too late for arrangments to be changed, the dept emailed schools countermanding their original advice.
The ALP is, of course, leading this week’s stopwork metings, as the Age’s mis-captioned photo illustrates.
Given this latter fact, and the communication from the ALP-governed NSW education Dept, one imagines that all teachers in NSW would be quite entitled to sue if their salaries are docked today, given that the stopwork meeting is not only condoned but actively organised by their employer.
Time once again to play “count the crowd”. Yesterday the Age helpfully reported the turnout as 100,000 - before the rally even started. Most tv news played it safe with “tens of thousands”. The Age this morning is offering “as many as 120,000”. More informed guesses to follow shortly. In the meantime, Steve Bracks advised Victorian public servants that they were free to attend the rally on flextime or recreation leave.
FACT: There weren’t 120,000, not even 100,000. I’d say 40-50,000 tops.
UNDENIABLE FACT: There were more COLLINGWOOD supporters there than there were at the 2002-2003 grand finals!
Posted by Yuval Legendtofski on 2005 06 30 at 10:07 PM • permalinkMy local Trades Hall troglodyte told us via the ABC that “over 250 `workers’” had travelled to Melbourne via union supplied buses.
The bus company puts the figure at less than 100.
So if the Spencer Street Stalin claims 100K for the Melbourne lie-fest, I reckon we can believe that around 25K to 30K, seventies vintage unionists, social workers, sundry public servants, greens and socialist workers’ party hacks turned up to listen to the laughable “them bosses is bad” speeches.
How so very last century of them!
Razor — Do you actually see any women in that crowd? And if you do, please don’t point them out…
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2005 06 30 at 10:29 PM • permalinkGood god, the Libs elected the Stay-Puft Marshamallow Man. Somebody cross the streams….!
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2005 06 30 at 10:31 PM • permalinkAustralia currently has 1.4 million union members, and 1.8 million self-employed business owners and operators. Welcome to the 21st century.
Posted by Young and Free on 2005 06 30 at 10:43 PM • permalinkDannah — Are you sure there’s only one man in that coat?
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2005 06 30 at 11:07 PM • permalinkRough calculation (to be read in Professor Frink voice): if we allow for an occupied street width of 30m, and a generous crowd density of 2 people per square metre (pretty damn snug), the ‘march’ of 100,000 would have had to be about 1.6 km long, and it was nothing like that. Even ABC news had them at about 3 city blocks, which is roughly 600 metres, i.e., less than half of what you need.
Richard Mcenroe - my point exactly.
I am fortunate enough to work in a work place with a majority of attractive women (and doesn’t my wife know it!!)(We have very strict hiring policies!). Yesterday afternoon they were all very focussed on End-of-Financial Year drinky poos. I doubt they were even aware of the protests.
Personally I think it is a red letter day that the ‘Pillow’ actually decided to stand for something.
Hell, I’d call it a red letter day when that wobbly mask can actually stand…
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2005 06 30 at 11:54 PM • permalinkPretty dismal roll-out, especially for Melbourne, where eejits will go to the opening of an envelope. When’s the penny going to drop with these retards that they don’t have public support, but do have memberships that are declining faster than Mark Latham’s testosterone supply?
BTW- that game’s a hoot, Donnah- it made my day seeing a cute lil’ pup tearing out Michael Moore, Babra Streisand and Ted Kennedy’s jugulars.
mask=mass
If Australia only made decent sangria I wouldn’t have to drink this supemarket crap…
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2005 06 30 at 11:55 PM • permalinkWhat you can’t see in the shot is the CFMEU badge Beazley was wearing, visible in the Herald Sun print edition.
He must think everyone in the crowd came down in the last shower.
Obviously The Age confused him with Kym Wilson. It’s a mistake anyone could make.
Posted by blandwagon on 2005 07 01 at 12:23 AM • permalinkLeast they didn’t confuse him with Kim Carnes… “He’s got Mark Latham’s eyes….*slap* *slap*”
Posted by richard mcenroe on 2005 07 01 at 12:40 AM • permalinkI was one of the hundreds of thousands inconvenienced by the protest when my Collins St tram was diverted to LaTrobe St behind five others. From what I saw and from the press photos, there is no way this one was as large as the Kennett protests. Then the press generally questioned the police estimate of the crowd, preferring the union estimate. This time I haven’t even read a police estimate, just the organiser’s line.
If you kind of half-close your eyes, it sort of looks like R2D2 is standing behind Kym. Ominous?
Posted by Susan Norton on 2005 07 01 at 01:47 AM • permalinkwhat were those w@nkers protesting about anyways??
the legislation hasn’t even been introduced into the house and debated…...noone knows what’s in it, has seen the fine print or the nuts and bolts.
it’s just a protest for the sake of it.
anyhow, the way some senators are talking…...barnaby joyce, family first guy and the west aussies, there’s no guarantee the IR bills will get thru.
Barnaby Joyce is the great white hope of the chattering classes; watch him toe the line when the whip has a word in his shell-like. A single term senator’s not much of a career, and he doesn’t have the option of becoming an independent like crazy Bob Katter Jr- independents don’t get elected to the senate in Qld.
Kymbo should dump the ‘large by huge’ tent suits and just wear a Mumu - Think of the poor non-union Vietnamese sweatshop workers who had to make his suit. They woulda had to lay it out in the car-park after work hours…FOR SHAME KYM!
Posted by Lucky Nutsacks on 2005 07 01 at 03:45 AM • permalinkEverything I’ve heard from people about the IR stuff just sounds insane and the kind of propaganda driven crap we see pour out of the MSM.
Put simply, is there any part of the IR that has details worked out yet? Like that 100 person minimum limit on unfair dismissal laws?
Posted by Aging Gamer on 2005 07 01 at 05:49 AM • permalinkBernie Slattery has more on this ‘70s-style Melbourne retro-rally.
If bosses stopped acting like ultra-retro 19th Century mill-owners then the workers would not resort to comparatively modern 70s styly rallies. Here is a typical tale that Tim B. might be interested in bringing to his readers attention.
Last year, the employees of clothing manufacturer Coogi lost their jobs. Their pay and leave entitlements, amounting to about $2 million, appeared to be lost too.
Soon after, it was revealed that company boss Jacky Taranto had used Coogi cash to pay the mortgage on his multimillion-dollar Richmond property.
Plus, shortly before the failure came to light, the workers had been transferred into separate companies that had no means to pay their benefits.
They were treated as “serfs,” Federal Court Judge Ronald Merkel later said.
Not an isolated case:
The Australian Council of Trade Unions estimates that every year 19,000 workers lose their entitlements when companies go bust.
Maybe, while Tim B. is at it, he might like to refresh his readers memory with the tale Stan Howard (name sound familiar) who ripped his workers off their entitlements, got the tax-payer to foot the bill and now lives high on the hog in Point Piper.
Filthy bloodsucking parasite.
PS Anyway, whats wrong with the ‘70’s. I believe that era was the coming-of age of Tim Blair and other notable blogistanian luminaries.
If bosses stopped acting like ultra-retro 19th Century mill-owners then the workers would not resort to comparatively modern 70s styly rallies.
“The workers” are mostly laughing at the minority among themselves that still act like 70s holdovers, in my experience. But keep pretending that this is some kind of mass movement, not just the usual anti-everything brigade protesting for protest’s sake.
on a more serious note, bomber beazley looks like the the purple people eater with the megaphone surgically attached to his forehead ...
What Taranto at Googi did was wrong, plain and simple.
How the reforms to IR laws apparantly proposed by Howard (I will wait for the legislation after a round through the senate - I am sure there will be some ambit claims in the first round to let Senator Joyce save face) have any thing to do with teh Googi case is beyond me.
This was resolved through the judicial system after all - not the joke called the Industrial Relations Tribunal, whch Howard is proposing to junk.
I visit blogs from all sides so that I might form an opinion on isssues that concern me. I scanned the slaging match with Flute the other day and put it down to one-upmanship. The hue of those posts where that “Support your contention in a logical, polite manner, or FOAD.” And so he was banned.
Today I returned to get your collective spin on IR reforms and the protest rally. Sadly this thread is full of sexist “I am fortunate enough to work in a work place with a majority of attractive women (and doesn’t my wife know it!!)(We have very strict hiring policies!). Yesterday afternoon they were all very focussed on End-of-Financial Year drinky poos. I doubt they were even aware of the protests.” hateful “Hell, I’d call it a red letter day when that wobbly mask can actually stand” exaggerated “I was one of the hundreds of thousands inconvenienced ” elitist “chattering classes” comments. If this is the liberal view god help the workers.And by the way regarding “what were those w@nkers protesting about anyways??
the legislation hasn’t even been introduced into the house and debated”. The word democracy comes from the Greek (I feel like I’m writing “My big fat greek wedding”) demos meaning people in a state and kratos meaning power to rule. I’m sure you can work it out from there.The word democracy comes from the Greek (I feel like I’m writing “My big fat greek wedding”) demos meaning people in a state and kratos meaning power to rule. I’m sure you can work it out from there.
You don’t need to explain democracy here, but you might try explaining it to the small but loud minority trying to scupper the people’s government’s programme.
Jack Strocchi: your comment
Maybe, while Tim B. is at it, he might like to refresh his readers memory with the tale purple people eater with the megaphone surgically attached to his forehead ...
was breaking the page so I deleted it. Please don’t try to use formatting code while drunk or high or whatever was the matter with you when you posted that. In fact, maybe you shouldn’t comment here at all until you sober up, or calm down, or get some sleep. By the way, I did not save the url you attempted to pass on about “tale purple people eater” (whatever the hell that may be), because it was totally cacked.
Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2005 07 01 at 06:44 PM • permalinkBudge, what is your point?
Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2005 07 01 at 06:45 PM • permalinkAnd actually, after reading through the comments I think that what happened was that Jack started to leave a second one, but while he was typing a meteor crashed through the ceiling of his home, smashing him into a thousand atoms and coincidently causing the half-finished comment, with the incomplete url, to be uploaded, where it underwent some sort of cybermeld with comment #44. Weird.
Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2005 07 01 at 06:49 PM • permalinkAndrea,
my first point was that this thread is contrary to the agreement made when registering on this site, and is exactly what Flute was banned for. There is no structured debate, rather it contains hateful and offensive unsubstantiated labour & union bashing. In hindsight that a 70’s style union rally should be the catalyst is ironic.My second point is that this weeks union rally is part of the democratic process.I admit that I need not have made this point but regarding people who want to exercise their right to be heard as w@nkers annoyed me.
Budge, if you have come to defend your little friend, it isn’t working. I banned flute because he insulted the other commenters for no reason. If that is too difficult for you to grasp, and you remain unhappy at the way this blog is run, I suggest you find another blog that is more congenial to your likes and dislikes.
Posted by Andrea Harris, Administrator on 2005 07 01 at 10:56 PM • permalinkAndrea,
I did not come to defend Flute, I never said banning him was a bad thing. Actually I was agreeing with your action and using that thread as an example of when debate degenerates into a slagging match. He is not my “little friend” although I have read his blog from time to time as I do this one and others. I have no problem with the way you run this blog only with the posts on this thread. Perhaps we should leave it there. Have a nice weekend.i think barnaby joyce is more a one nation guy than a national senator…....he always seems to be carrying a big chip on his shoulder in that typical country queensland fashion.
so far he supports compulsory student unionism and is against IR reform…....so what’s he doing in the national party??
a party that represents farmers and small business.if the IR reform gets scuppered i wonder how barnaby’s constituents will feel in the future when farmers’ produce is held up on the docks because of some union blockade??
i wonder what support he would get from country queensland…....he’s the worst type of politician, someone who sneeks in under the radar without declaring what he stands for and basically deceiving the electorate.
whether you love or hate howard you know what he stands for, he’s always honest and does what he says.
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Personally I think it is a red letter day that the ‘Pillow’ actually decided to stand for something. Way to go Kimmy Lad, you grew a spine. Well at least the blokes you owe favours to gre one and told you to as well.
Still a completely shithouse position, but at least he decided to stand for something. Pretty soon, he may decide to stand for something worthwhile and then after that, who knows. Maybe actually have a coherent thought. Sky’s the limit then.