...achieving outcomes, going forward.

rollad20andkissme: YYYAAAAASSSSSSS

Tue, 07 May 2013 11:19:17 +1000

rollad20andkissme:

YYYAAAAASSSSSSS

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Tue, 07 May 2013 07:56:40 +1000

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Sun, 05 May 2013 21:26:18 +1000

nonlawyerylawyer: manicbotanic: Snaps of platforms 26 & 27...

Wed, 01 May 2013 10:36:48 +1000

nonlawyerylawyer:

manicbotanic:

Snaps of platforms 26 & 27 at Central Station, Sydney. They were never operational, but were once used for document storage. They are located above platforms 24/25, which explains why 24/25 are so deep beneath the station. Apparently there are locked doors off the staircase leading to 24/25 which access the abandoned platforms.

Matthew Lee….

Sensational gunzel optics.

Larger/higher res version here.

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 12:40:00 +1000

Larger/higher res version here.

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Tue, 23 Apr 2013 14:43:15 +1000

"REAL TALK: When Gen x or y are the age Boomers are now Amanda Palmer will be one of the people the..."

Mon, 22 Apr 2013 23:05:39 +1000

“REAL TALK: When Gen x or y are the age Boomers are now Amanda Palmer will be one of the people the youngsters below us will use as evidence for why we should all be killed and we will have no excuse because we did nothing.”

- Just some feelings I had after reading that Palmer has published a poem inspired by the Boston Marathon bombing suspect

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Mon, 08 Apr 2013 14:55:37 +1000

Check out this tumblr of people complaining about Qantas...

Sat, 06 Apr 2013 15:32:11 +1100

Check out this tumblr of people complaining about Qantas slightly altering their in-flight menu to be appropriate for the region they’re flying to due to their deal recent with Emirates. The rage is almost certainly inspired by a ‘just asking questions’ blog post from popular wingnut blogger Andrew Bolt.

withabang: Lee Lin Chin - World News Australia...

Thu, 14 Mar 2013 18:15:28 +1100

withabang:

Lee Lin Chin - World News Australia (via ichthyologist)

Richard Dawkins's face contorts in pain. "I need to make myself part of the abortion debate," he says, "but how can I shit on both the religious AND women?" His pig butler approaches him meekly with milky, tepid tea balanced on a platter in his little pig mouth, and after fetching Pigglesby his evening thrashing Dawkins gasps, "Eureka!"

Thu, 14 Mar 2013 17:20:08 +1100

Richard Dawkins using the abortion debate as a medium to prove he has a large penis compared to other people on the internet. That of course includes anyone who’s religion happens to be a bit thingy about pig meat.

While we’re on the topic of the former Howard government...

Thu, 07 Mar 2013 12:37:41 +1100

While we’re on the topic of the former Howard government and the facts about what happened at Gallipoli, here’s The Phillip Ruddock Blues by TISM

Do you remember when Australia’s federal education...

Thu, 07 Mar 2013 11:41:00 +1100

Do you remember when Australia’s federal education minister was Brendan Nelson? When Australia’s minister for education was in the media telling Islamic schools to teach Australian values or “clear off?” When, to promote the teaching of said Australian values in schools, Dr Nelson required “that all schools have a functioning flagpole, fly the Australian flag and display the poster Values for Australian Schooling” in order to receive federal education funding. That all schools display a poster about values featuring the image of Simpson and his donkey. When Minister Nelson justified his threat to Islamic schools on the basis that “if we lose sight of what Simpson and his donkey represents, then we will lose our direction as a country.” Remember all this? I know I do.

Well this is Australia. Today.

So what are we to do when, after a century of veneration, the legend of Simpson and his donkey is officially punctured and new evidence emerges that the story is largely a myth inflated and exaggerated by the sloppy work of journalists, amateur historians and jingoistic politicians.

A year-long inquiry by a government tribunal last week flatly rejected the long-running populist campaign to have Simpson awarded a posthumous Victoria Cross - the highest award for gallantry in the Commonwealth. But, more significantly, the tribunal found that Simpson’s deeds were no more exceptional than those of hundreds of other stretcher bearers working at Gallipoli at the time. The inquiry’s report said there were many accounts describing Simpson’s conduct. ”The tribunal was, however, unable to find any witness accounts of a specific act of valour … which could single out Simpson’s bravery from other stretcher-bearers in the Field Ambulance.”

In the process of what has been the most forensic review of Simpson’s war service, the tribunal heard startling evidence that much of the legend of the man with the donkey has been built on false or faulty evidence, richly embellished over the years as history has been turned into hagiography.

Source: Taken for a ride?

Original pdf (50kb) of the Values for Australian Schooling poster can be found here.

The Trinity

Thu, 07 Mar 2013 10:45:07 +1100

elomis:

A lot of talk on Twitter this morning about the teenage reveler at the Mardi Gras who appears in video footage being slammed on his back while handcuffed and then appears stood-on by the officer who slammed him. In the footage a second officer instructs the person videoing proceedings to stop without authority.

Police have said this morning that he has been charged with assault police, resisting arrest, and offensive language. Some folks in response have uttered a low whistle, remarking that “he has been charged with a serious offence”. Between that police comment, and the reaction to it from everyone else, you’d be forgiven for thinking that there’s now two sides to the story and we can all stop being so judgy about NSW police who have a “hard job to do”.

Nonsense.

The person has been charged with what some lawyers and others describe as “the trinity”. The trinity refers to those specific three offences, and they are called the trinity when they police charge someone with them because they have nothing else to charge with.

Why those charges? Quite simple; they are the three things police can charge people that creates the impression that the accused has done something wrong (otherwise why would they be charged right?) but also they are the three charges there is no public backlash for if they fail in court.

Why no backlash? They are simply the three charges that nobody cares if they fail.

If a court dismisses a charge of assault police, it’s still believable that the accused was doing something wrong, but it’s just when they were apprehended by police they didn’t also behave in a manner which constitutes assaulting police

Similarly if a court dismisses a charge of resisting arrest, the public are invited to believe that while the suspect was guilty of an offence he was being arrested for, his behaviour during that arrest was just not itself enough to also constitute an offence

The offence of offensive language is slightly different. The first two charges are about believing that someone has done something wrong but just didn’t also didn’t make it worse when the police tried to apprehend them. The offensive language charge is more an overarching issue about being able to give a shit either way. It’s something the police can charge for (and now say the accused is facing three charges relating to events during the mardi gras parade) and if it’s dismissed (it almost always is) there will never be a public outcry that police appear to have fabricated a charge of swearing. Because nobody could care whether the accused swore or not.

One offence nobody cares about that shouldn’t even be an offence, and two which don’t actually address what an accused is supposed to have done, but rather what they did when police sought to apprehend them for it.

The trinity is not “serious offences”, it’s effectively a character assassination designed to give somebody a charge record in the absence of having genuine recourse against behaviour which is genuinely societally unacceptable. It’s an abuse of process so that homophobic (or more commonly racist) police can assert authority without accountability.

phetdreams: Presented without comment Presented without...

Thu, 07 Mar 2013 09:49:14 +1100

phetdreams:

Presented without comment

Presented without attribution too. I’ll see you in court.

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Thu, 07 Mar 2013 08:52:47 +1100

This gif, is making me thirsty. (It really is)

Thu, 07 Mar 2013 07:56:39 +1100

This gif, is making me thirsty. (It really is)

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Wed, 06 Mar 2013 22:08:50 +1100

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Wed, 06 Mar 2013 22:07:57 +1100

“Ted Baillieu was [the] second-longest serving Premier in...

Wed, 06 Mar 2013 22:06:33 +1100

“Ted Baillieu was [the] second-longest serving Premier in the country at 2 years 4 months” - Ben Raue

For those that don’t know, this man is Eddie Obeid, a man who was essentially the top power broker, a.k.a. “factional warlord,” in the NSW Labor party when we burnt through three premiers in one term and who’s family’s business dealings have been the subject of an explosive ICAC inquiry. Prominent members of the NSW Labor right faction were also behind the push to dump Kevin Rudd as Prime Minister in 2010. The tendency for political leaders to be rolled or swapped mid-term is now being called NSW disease.