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On another note, why is Shbaz reading the tele?

It's almost academic now to boot, thanks to events.

Our foreign minister keeps saying that the best way the G8 can help Africa is removing agriculture subsidies. It is true they're not doing much good to anyone in the long run, but his stance probably doesn't have anything to do with the fact that Australia, along with Canada and New Zealand, is the only industrialised country that can feed itself and export food...and hence would benefit greatly from removal of said subsidies.......

The Londoners on the news seem remarkably calm, especially when you consider that the cameras would be looking for the hysterical and screaming since they make more dramatic footage.

Stiff upper lip, what what.

It's unfortunate too that any prospect of an African centred G8 summit has been scuppered. It claims victims in a wide radius I guess.

It is what happened in the book, and it was just as sudden.

Cali has a population about 3/4 that of South Africa, and about the same as Canada, so I'd expect a great deal of diversity in incomes and other economic aspects.

Is it true that SF still has rent controls on much of it's accomodation? It's just that rent control is a bemusing idea.

We did test the water for this years Mittens IMMEDIETLY after last years Mittens, so there was a very very very long period for prospective candidates to give some indication they were coming. Just indication that epople other than AGA would buy a plane ticket and it could have gone ahead, but there was by far not enough reaction by the time we reintroduced it later on.


Mittens Australia won't happen unless the rest of you give some reason for it to be organised. If it's organised on vague promises of that's cool, most of the people who said they would come would soft cock out of it anyway.

The Superdome and the rest of the Olympic Park complex is a large white elephant though. It probably isn't visible in the QLD media, but the fact that most of it is idle and not used [including the Olympic Stadium itself since club games are crappy there. You get a robust 30,000 crowd and 2/3 seats are empty, doesn't look very good].

It still is a nice complex, but there isn't a huge continuation of use.

I can understand that the catastophic failure of a team to score with 6 gazillion back to back sets would tear the confidence out of a team.

I mean, if you can't score then, when the hell can you score?

[and on the referee, remember it was the QRL that blocked the appointment of Tim Mander, who is a queenslander, and who was nominated by Robert Finch as the best referee]

Wow, if British cooking was better, Chiraq wouldn't have been able to insult it and lose Paris' bid as a result.

But anyway, from my meagre knowledge of the bids, it probably was the right decision.

I was up for Matt King for MoS as well. I couldn't see Minichello in consideration at all to tell the truth.

and there there Kinoko, there's no shame in losing to the best.

I thought we were all going to Gilbert's apartment in Hong Kong.

Am I right in my impression from the trailers that the film is vaguely in the same vein as the book, insofar the book's invasion mirrored colonialism and the film appears to mirror 20th century genocide, rather than being flag waving Independence Day, violent forces of liberation crap?

Woooo! Somebody's jealous of Sonny Bill!

But it's also bad when people attack people who don't deserve it when they're built up by the media. Players like Sonny Bill [or Johns and Lockyer for that matter] are hyped by supporters and media, not themselves. They're not angry little pretentious weasels like Hewitt and probably don't deserve the crap.

On another note, all the debate about the problems in Africa is bizaarely 300 years out of date. The Live 8 people are saying that it's unequal trade relationships, their critics say it's the countries' inability to export efficiently.

What? Is this 1700? You would have thought that these Mercantilist ideas would have died out when countries realised wealth was what your people could buy, rather than what they could sell. The likes of Canada and Australia have rarely ever experienced trade surpluses yet have amongst the highest living standards in theworld, whereas Saudi Arabia and co have large trade surpluses and large poor populations.

Even with all the chatter about globalisation, most people making their living from the people around them, and that's what has to be developed.


The purposes of these people may be noble, but clinging to ye olde notion of "Exports good, imports bad" is bemusing and archaic.


On another note, it's sad enough that it takes rock stars to get people to pay any attention to poverty, but it's even sadder when people choose to splurt lame hyperbole without even lip service to the stated cause [look up the thread and see if you can find one!].

And why didn't McCartney have the decency to get himself shot or killed in some fashion [like, I mean a second time or something] so people could remembe him as an illusion rather than the sad fact of what he really is [and always was].

Funny thing is, I have never ever found someone who does like Hewitt.

Likewise with Shane Warne, or even Russel Crowe. Maybe the media services are just nuts about who  they'll assume rate well and are maybe out of touch.

Anyway, I dislike individual sportsmen on the whole generally. I find it a bit hard to support someone who is the sole beneficiary of their effort as it were.

I agree with Sylpher that it's stupid and annoying, but not a criminal matter. You might as well pass a law to ban wearing pants around your arse....

Restrictions on smoking are another matter, since bass doesn't give illnesses to passive listeners, plus, you carry the stink of other people's smoke in your hair and clothes long after they've gone, bass dissapears into the ether.

Thing is, if we were to really crack down on stupid behaiviour in cars, we'd have to simply ban the damn things. They cause more death and injuries than almost any other element in society, and the intelligence of anyone who gets in one drops aout 40% as soon as they get behind the wheel, leaving them a degrenerate blob of anger who blames their speeding on cops or...well...thinks that loud bass is a criminal manner.

My DVD drive's manual said it could be changed 6 times before it stuck.

I changed it once and it stuck...but then I just got a program workaround anyway [and plus I watch DVDs on the DVD player which has no regions]. It beats me why they persist with regions.

oh Japanese art
oxymoronical term
stagnant decadence

now met with a cringe
nihonjinron enslaved
kowtows to US

Tokugawa's dead
deep fried culture imported
lets write some textbooks

He likes saying his own name, even when tearfully flying to his heroic death.

It's beautiful.