Yes, it's that time of year again already!
Aung San Suu Kyi's house arrest has been extended for another 6 months by the Burmese junta.
I think the reason they've made it only 6 months this time, instead of usual 12, is because it's against the law for them to hold anyone for more than 5 years (which it will be in November) without trial.
And, of course, her supporters have been seized by police... so say some prayers or whatever.
Poor bloody Burma...
Anyone figured this one out yet?
Fourth severed foot washes up on Canadian coast
Another severed human foot has been discovered washed ashore on Canada's Pacific coast, but police are no closer to solving the gruesome mystery.
The foot, still wearing a shoe, was discovered on a small uninhabited island south of Vancouver in the Strait of Georgia.
It was the fourth right foot discovered in the region in the past 10 months.
The previous cases all involved right feet still in sneakers, and each was found on a different island.
DNA testing has failed to link the earlier discoveries to any missing person cases.
Is there something wrong with me? I've just finished reading Geraldine Brooks' novel March. It won a Pulitzer. But... I didn't like it!
I appreciate the history and research; the most interesting part of the book for me was the Afterword as it discussed these areas of her work, including how she used Alcott's own family. Mind you, just because she has done some research, it doesn't mean her historical novel is accurate (she admits this herself, that at the time Mississippi plantations would not have been leased to Northerners).
Regardless of the history stuff... I didn't like the book. I found it a dull chore to read and a bit soppy. It didn't tell me anything much new about the Civil War (I think I learnt more from
watching Gone With the Wind! Perhaps Brooks should have had someone fashion a frock from a set of curtains...). And there were no new themes explored (I'm quite aware that ideals are not always practicable in reality; and that there are difficulties in the marriage of two different people). Plus, I didn't like the main character.
He's based on Alcott's father (whom Mr March originally was based on). But we don't see enough of his strengths to appreciate the impact of his, all too often revealed, weaknesses. And he's just so... dull! They all are, except for the slaves who actually have a clue about what's going on around them, but unfortunately they are mostly well-stereotyped.
Is the main character being devoid of character, dumb (when he's supposed to be an intellectual, forward-thinker) and naive a bad reason for not liking the book? Should I be appreciating how supposedly great people are actually silly and pathetic, and have no real depth of character?
Are any of you - who have read this and loved it (like I was expecting to) - cringing in disgust at my critique? If so, I'm very sorry, maybe I'll read it again one day, decades from now, and really love it and have no idea why I found fault...!
A big reason may be that I've never managed to read Little Women. Like most white Western girls I was encouraged to read the book. But, unlike most girls it seems, I couldn't stand how goody-goody and fake they all were. So, perhaps if I'd cherished that book I would have enjoyed reading 'the other side' of the story; seen the gaps filled.
Even not having read Little Women, it was fairly obvious which parts of the story were from that novel, as well as which parts were taken from actual events or the writings of real life characters - a little jarring actually.
What I'm saying is that, maybe you need to come to the book carrying a sentimentality about the March family.
And, I know that she is writing as the character, March; as a man of that era and with overly romantic notions (it seems)... but, is such as this (below) really necessary?
For we married each other that night, there on a bed of fallen pine needles - even today the scent of pitch-pine stirs me - with Henry's distant flute for a wedding march and the arching white birch boughs for our basilica. At first, she quivered like an aspen, and I was ashamed at my lack of continence, yet I could not let go of her. I felt like Peleus on the beach, clinging to Thetis only to find that, suddenly, it was she who held me; that same furnace in her nature that had flared up in anger blazed again, in passion.
Lord, but I am so tired of hearing "alcopops"! Alcopops, alcopops, alcopops!!! Will it ever go away?!! (It's really enough to drive one to drink...)
"Alcopops" is a silly Brit term. And it's a silly tax that Labor's applying too. Of course it's just for revenue and to close a tax 'loophole'. (Not that they'll steadily admit this.)
But don't get me wrong. I fully support it!!!
Obviously this is not because I have a hate of drunken teenagers... that would be a bit hypocritical as I was one myself (and never used a mixer - What? Dilute it? Horrors!!). (Oh, and when times were tough it was onto the 4-litre Fruity Lexia. Hey. If it was good enough for us...)
No, I'm in support of the tax hike cause the biggest consumers of premix drinks are big-gutted, 30-40-something, ute-drivin' blokes... (such as my ex for example, who was (regularly and overly) fond of premixed bourbon and colas, which I think is absolutely disgusting, as coke will rot your gut).
Plus, the tax increase is also targeting people who obviously have no taste. Which is only fair really. A 'Poor Taste Tax'. (Shit. Hope it doesn't apply to ex-boyfriends...)
Quokkas may be safe... but nuts should be protected from Buswell's (surely well-practiced) 'squirrel-grip'.
Will brassieres, chairs or cajones EVER FEEL SAFE AGAIN!!!!!?
If you're going to try and "placate carers angry about the budget", and you're in an elected position... then it's probably not a good idea to park your ministerial car in a disabled spot at the time.
The budget may be requiring "tough decisions" (and no bunnies out of bonnets), but surely there are also tough decisions for voters of Big Brother housemates'!*
Yes. I have just watched almost an entire episode of Big Mouth. Never managed to watch one of its previous incarnations as BB Up Late (the only snippets I caught once were of males bragging about female prey they had caught: "Yeah, mate. She really wanted me." etc, etc, with details too gory to repeat. That was enough for me.) But, of course, tonight Paul McDermott and I are too excited to sleep on Budget Eve (yes, I saw a bit of Good News Week too, oh the shame of admitting to all this Channel 10 viewing when surely you'd pictured me permanently glued to good ol' wholesome Aunty/ABC (with a bit of oh-so-raunchy SBS on the side... (and I'm just talking about the banter between its news hosts (riveting!)))).
Anyway, in case you missed it, here's some highlights:
One guest was Angela Conway from the Australian Family Association. (Egad, I'm yawning just typing that!) Yes, the audience was as thrilled as you would expect (and yes, this show has an audience - grown men did 'woo hoo!' in a loud and exuberant fashion). Being a kind of expert she confidently explained that it was 'not suitable' to put 17 year old Corey on the show because it has 'put him in the spotlight'. Yes. Poor Corey. By getting an agent and organising an 'east coast party tour', you know, which he had to 'postpone' due to 'media commitments', you could tell that he's really been trying to avoid that spotlight thing.
Another guest was newly-evicted Saxon. Oh, Saxon. Gosh. Won't you be missed. He looks like beefy, tattooed Popeye but with a Kewpie Doll head.
1. Burma's Junta
Burma's military regime is being stubborn and annoying:
...delaying visas for UN workers and other relief agencies. While the regime said little, observers said the reason for hesitation was clear: the junta fears an influx of foreigners could spur fresh unrest following pro-democracy protests last September, which were put down violently.
The nation's military Government has refused permission for the US to send aid to the country, and its troops have been accused of doing little to help the clean-up.
Mr Rudd has told Fairfax Radio that it is "obscene" that Burma's junta is obstructing the world's efforts to help the cyclone victims.
"The Burmese regime is behaving appallingly," Mr Rudd told Fairfax Radio Network.
Mr Rudd spoke to Australia's ambassador Bob Davis this morning, who told him the Burmese military hadn't budged on the issue of foreign help overnight.
"(This is) not just frustrating our own aid agencies but frustrating the international community," he said.
Mr Rudd believes the junta may have even turned back two of four UN workers who arrived in Burma last night to carry out a critical assessment of the situation."This is an extraordinary reaction. What can we do about it?" he said.
"I'm hoping later today or over the course of the weekend to speak with the secretary-general of the United Nations to see what we can do globally to leverage the Burmese into a better course of action."
Oh, and there also looks like - apart from all the dead and the 1.5 million homeless - there's an outbreak of cholera.Four United Nations aid planes reached Burma overnight but there has been widespread criticism of the junta's reluctance to allow more aid in.
Rescue crews have been deported by Burma's military junta, just a day after arriving in the disaster-stricken nation.UPDATE 2:
The Burmese government declared it is "not ready" for foreign search-and-rescue teams following the devastating cyclone, which has left some 100,000 dead and millions without homes.
Burma's junta has impounded two United Nations food aid shipments at Rangoon airport, officials said, triggering more outrage at the military government's refusal to accept a major international relief operation.UPDATE 10/5: Some aid getting through (Tim Costello, World Vision). And Rudd tells UN "Australia will offer further aid to Burma after the initial commitment of $3 million."
"We're going to have to shut down our very small airlift operation until we get guarantees from the authorities," a furious World Food Program (WFP) regional director Tony Banbury told CNN.
"It should be on trucks headed to the victims. You've seen the conditions they are in. That food is now sitting on a tarmac doing no good," Mr Banbury said.
Not that she can compete with the Burmese junta...
"You know, my dad took me out behind the cottage that my grandfather built on a little lake called Lake Winola outside of Scranton and taught me how to shoot when I was a little girl," she said.
Democrats wait and wonder when Hillary Clinton will concede defeatAnd:
The latest on Hillary's journey to the exit
It's over
And the New York Post hit the streets with cruel tabloid succinctness: a picture of the home-state senator over a single word—“TOAST!”—in block letters three inches high.
Every mother loves her baby, every baby is valued and Mr Rudd should value all babies equally.
We should not live in Australia where Mr Rudd thinks that some babies are more valuable than others, it's very, very important that Mr Rudd understand that every mother loves her baby and this should be an Australia where all babies are equal.
"I thought, what an extraordinary situation where you can have someone who I know has a household income in excess of half a million dollars actually thinking about changing a vote on the basis of whether or not they will receive a non-means tested childcare cash rebate," he said.
"The whole point is any government needs to ensure that those who are most in need are the people who receive most of the benefits that government provides. You have to ask yourselves, have we lost the plot or haven't we?"
See, Rudd's not the only one who can ask himself (sensible) questions. Perhaps ol' 9%-Brendan should get back into the habit.
RECALLING British prime minister Harold Wilson's observation that a week is a long time in politics, Brendan Nelson says that the 23 weeks since the federal election have been a political eternity. It shows. The Opposition is displaying all the symptoms of relevance deprivation syndrome, as former Labor minister Gareth Evans once described it.
The Opposition's political strategy is not hard to divine. As quickly as it can, it wants to shift the blame for anything that goes wrong with the economy from the Coalition to Labor. ... But constructing this political edifice has strained his credibility. It is not only the Government taking inflation seriously. The Reserve Bank said on Tuesday that "inflation in Australia has been high over the past year" and it has been putting up interest rates to counter it. Everyone who buys petrol or does the shopping knows prices are going up. Yet Nelson is seriously suggesting that if only the Government stopped talking about it, it would go away.
THE woman at the centre of the seat-sniffing scandal involving West Australian Opposition Leader Troy Buswell says he writhed in mock sexual pleasure during the incident.
The woman... told The West Australian newspaper that Mr Buswell sniffed her chair twice within 10 minutes, while groaning and making "sexually satisfying noises".
"We finished the meeting (with a constituent), I walked the bloke downstairs and out of parliament, and when I got back I walked into the room to pick up my notepad from the desk and Buswell started grabbing the chairs going `aahww, which one did you sit in? I'll be able to tell'," she said.
"And then he picked them up and started sniffing them and groaning and making sexually satisfying noises. I went, `you're sick, knock it off', and grabbed my staff and walked out, but he didn't pay attention to a word I said."
The woman said she was standing with colleagues about 10 minutes later when one of them knocked on Mr Buswell's door to ask one of his staff to lunch.
"Buswell opened the door really wide, grabbed a chair and started sniffing it, lifted it above his head sniffing it and breathing in, going `aaww yeah'," the woman said.
"It was awful. My colleagues, the four men I worked with, were just stunned into silence."
