Webdiary - Founded and Inspired by Margo Kingston

Well, Fat and Rude has finally done it: MALCOLM BRUCE DUNCAN INDEPENDENT CANDIDATE FOR WENTWORTH

An email from GetUp: Two days ago I wrote to you with a question: should we pursue legal action to defend Australians' right to vote? An overwhelming 86% of GetUp members voted yes - so just moments ago, GetUp filed our case for online enrolment in the Federal Court. In addition to this, we're filing a related case in the High Court of Australia challenging the constitutionality of the Howard Government's 2006 Amendments to the Electoral Act. This is the piece of legislation that led to the situation we faced early week, where people had only one business day to enrol to vote.

Taking a firm stand on one’s position with regards to their religious beliefs has, for the past generation or so, been an area where political attacks are generally considered to be a no go zone. This is a good thing. Australia has developed into a tolerant society, where people’s beliefs are respected. Why then should atheism be any different?

From the Other Side, in that great kitty litter tray in the sky, Claude comments on the 2010 Federal Election. Read on ...

Now that we have audiovisually interactive mobile phones and permanently net-connected portable computers I wonder how far away a human-implantable Facebook Chip could be. Our heads already have cameras and microphones installed, so you'd only need a thought-to-font translator, video and audio uploading equipment and a Wi-Fi transceiver. With the flip of a mental (or physical) switch, any human could interact with the social network carried in their mind.

The latest update from the Democratic Audit program at Swinburne University of Technology, Melbourne, on how our democracy is working.

My first blog ever was a damp squib; deservedly so given the amount of effort I put into it. I've decided to give it another go for the reasons that there's a growing awareness of the subject and that next to climate change and sustainable population this is the most important issue facing us.

"Today, guided by my values, I want to share with you how I intend to move Australia forward to a stronger economy, with sustainable growth that delivers for hard-working Australians." - The Hon Julia Gillard MP, Prime Minister for Australia

Gandhi used non-violent actions to bring freedom to India. Maybe if we want to fight for a future for our grandchildren or bring equity to the children unfortunate enough to have been born in the third world we too will have to resort to non-violent action.

I invite anyone who is interested in seeing Webdiary continue to donate a piece on whatever they care to write about.

If you're younger you may not get the significance of this. This was world Internet and media history and Margo was making  it. In 2000 there were no comparable models. Not in the New York Times, not in the Washington Post and not even in that stupid bloody British rag that you wretched lefties love so much, the Guardian".- Harry Heidelberg

"Really, though, I'd lost the taste the day I was rooting around the glovebox of a car in the wreckers' yard to find out who'd had the prang.  Looking up from my endeavours I noticed one of the driver's teeth embedded in the steering wheel.  I thought to myself "so, this is journalism?" - Richard Tonkin

"There is a Homeric, epic quality about this tournament.  Mighty teams like the Spanish and the French choke at psychological moments and unheralded teams like the Koreans and Swiss take the opportunity for a moment in the sunshine perhaps anticipated for a generation"- Paul Walter

"When global leaders of any religious persuasion are delusional to the point where they believe they are doing "God’s Work", what hope is there for humanity when these fanatics have their fingers on the nuclear triggers?"- Keith Warren

We were all glad to see the back of Howard at one stage, but now the People are calling on Rudd Labor, in no uncertain terms, to unpack its alternative and fulfill its promises to Australians, rather than just slumming with those interests whos aims are contrary to the ordinary Australian.

"The enquiry will tell whether this is the case or whether there has been a monumental screw-up by BP and or the drilling contractor. One would imagine a deepwater drilling moratorium will be in place in the meantime."

Depending on which reports you believe, the number of dead killed by the Israelis numbers between eight and fourteen, and many more wounded.  The deaths have been condemned around the world  The European Union has condemned the attack, and an emergency session of the UN Security Council is now debating a response.

In the US, Britain and Europe, people who are the subject of an adverse security assessment are at least given the outline of the case against them, so explanations can be given to correct mistakes or confusions relating to the case against them, or even to dispel false allegations given by hostile governments."- Dale Mills

Scales fell away, as to the latter, after his performance earlier in the week, on Q & A. Reminds the writer of one of these dead fish you keep seeing washed up on teev news from the gulf oil spill.

"The case against BP Alaska involved a major oil company with strong political connections," West said. " We had several investigative avenues available to us that in my judgment as a veteran senior manager with the EPA Criminal Investigation Division would likely have led us to find criminal culpability on the part of a number of senior BP officials and to felonious behavior by this major corporation."

You get the whiff, reading the January reports in theOz about the matter, that the Australian Government might be interceding not so much out of concern for the ex-soldier than a need to minimise the negative publicity of an Afghan Murdering Aussie Mercenary.

Promising there'll be no sweatheart deals, and with the most public-painful cash-grab already fading from non-smokers' memories, Treasurer Swan intends to portray his team as sober, conservative leaders that can continue guiding us through the ongoing crisis.

Similarly, where it used to be thrilling to continue, in non-internet reality, conversations that were initiated on the internet, now a few kids are beginning to get the heebie-jeebies about how much personal information others know about them.

Feeble attempts by civilization to mitigate the climate are drowning in a tide of medieval conspiracy theories by man-over-nature ideologues. There is nowhere else the 6.5 billion of contemporary humans can go.

Of those grumbling about two bucks a pack back then, the ashes of many would be turning in their urns today on hearing of a quickly-announced Government tax of two dollars a packet to come into effect at midnight. 

There's a much deeper argument that war cannot end, to do with human nature. It says that we are warlike by nature, and can draw strong arguments from evolutionary psychology. Our ability and constitutional inclination to divide the human world into an 'us' and a 'them', and indeed to feel warlike toward the 'them', seems to be a part of our nature which we can thank for the survival of our family trees for the past million and more years. We can't throw it just by a bit of state indoctrination or mass participation in flower workshops. It's a strong argument.

People start to talk of "othering" - it's an ugly proposition to contemplate in this actuality, if you ask if we Australians are virtually "taking hostages", as some have put it, to our own uncertainties for our own futures?

I write this in response to the survey your office distributed recently entitled, "Your Views, Your Vote." I appreciate your attempt to obtain some information about the views of constituents, but felt the survey was inadequate and I could not complete it with any integrity. However I will attempt to address your twelve points, as well as make some remarks about things I feel are of critical importance but which the survey did not include.

The term “Drug War” was invented by the warriors themselves, but it is a very descriptive term and we should use it constantly. A war is something expensive, with casualties, and that requires constant justification on the basis of results. If our opponents try to avoid the term, don’t let them. It’s their term, it is apt, and we will insist on it. In our literature we always capitalise “The Drug War” or “The War on Drugs” as it is a proper noun for a historical event with a beginning… and an end.