And while we’re posing the big food-related questions here at GrodsCorp … is it wrong to read cookbooks on the toilet?

New South Wales farmers are being encouraged to start growing industrial hemp.

The Government recently passed legislation allowing the plant to be grown for use in products ranging from bio-fuel to dog food…

Mr Macdonald says hemp growth could become a lucrative industry for NSW.

“Already we’ve had over 200 farmers express interest in growing hemp across the state,” he said.

“It could become quite a significant crop in a very short period of time, particularly as various companies utilise the products of it for that broad range of products that can be created using industrial hemp as a base.”

The use of hemp in dog food might put smiles on the faces of pensioners, but at what cost? Imagine, with Miranda, what rural New South Wales will soon look like.

David: Despite its flaws - and it certainly has flaws - I think Australia is an impressive and important film… three and a half out of five.

Malcy: I think it was a great film… five out of five or four and a half out of five.

A MAN caught by police with his penis in a pasta sauce jar was still pleasuring himself while resisting arrest, a court has been told.

Police drew their weapons after New South Wales man Keith Roy Weatherley, 46, led them on a brief, slow-speed car chase, the Newcastle Herald reports.

[...]

They found a 750mm jar around his penis and said Weatherley attempted to continue “pleasuring himself in between bouts of wrestling”.

A search of his car uncovered pornography, a homemade sex aid, women’s stockings and a Jack Russell terrier.

Wanna make one for yourself at home?

Sadly, these idiots have apparently worked out how to make it to The Age’s website. Today The Age published an article on Indigenous people being concerned that the latest batch of tourism advertising promotes “trampling” of their culture. Fair enough, right? Would you graffiti the Vatican? Or urinate in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher?

Of course not. But for some reason, even though Indigenous culture goes back over 60,000 years (yes, that’s even before Jesus), Aboriginies should take their made-up “culture” and get fucked. Or at least that’s how readers of The Age see it:

“Typical. The aborigines (sic) are never happy. I am sure if they were paid they would say their ancestral spirits were at peace. The biggest problem with aboriginal (sic) ‘culture’ is that it is undocumented. So they make things up as they go. Oh my God, there’s money in it! Look another sacred site!”

“Of course this issue has come up. I smell a con for cash as compensation. “

“I suspect the filmakers (sic) sought and were granted permission. I also suspect that the people complaining did not get any kickbacks from the filming of Australia.”

“Will they ever be happy ??”

I can’t imagine what didn’t get approved. I’ll be updating this post throughout the day with new comments as they come in. As I write this, eight comments have been posted, and all of them are negative towards Indigenous people.

Aren’t Australians just salt of the earth?

New research by the Sydney Sexual Health Centre, based at Sydney Hospital in Macquarie Street, showed that a culture of binge drinking among young [backpackers] may be contributing to unsafe sexual behaviour and higher rates of infection when compared with the general population.

The centre’s acting director, Lynne Wray, said yesterday a study of 4382 travellers and 8810 non-travellers aged 18 to 30 who visited the clinic between 1998 and 2006 showed that the travellers were more than twice as likely to drink excessively.

They needed to do a study to work that out? There’s a reason that John Surname goes backpacking around the CBD of Melbourne every weekend.

McDonald’s Happy Meal isn’t so happy when the kids are warned mid-bite that other animals - no, not the ones they’re actually eating - are endangered. It’s even less happy when McDonald’s has the hide to claim that fluffy wuffy kangaroos, cute elephants and lovable pandas are those close to extinction. Do they really expect the kids to swallow that?

Except it’s not a “fluffy wuffy kangaroo”, but a yellow-footed rock wallaby, and the yellow-footed rock wallaby is listed as near-threatened.

And the “lovable” panda is very much endangered, while only about 10,000 African elephants remain in the wild.

Does Bolta really expect his readers to swallow his McTripe? Of course he does.

So I did, and I did.

After finally raising the money to purchase every copy of Still Not Sorry, maybe it’s time for Bolta to cut-and-paste more columns into a “book” called Still Not Sorry II: The Sequel.

3. frigging

A word that you should look up on urban dictionary, before you say in front of your mum.

Boy: Ahh frigging hell, i just spilt the milk.

Mum: Don’t say that, do you know what it means?

Boy: um no

Boy goes on urban dictionary
Boy: Shit

Here’s the first definition.

1. frigging

The art of performing a clitoral stimulation. cf frig

Lisa was frigging herself in the library again today.

Truly something learned every day.

Best what?

Sunday’s list:

Make driveway border. vacuum house.washing.clean kitchen.get river rocks.tidy house.fix logfire.plant maple tree.make roofing ladder.mesh for rainwater sump.fix rainwater tank.measure ethernet cable.clean windows.clean car.fix pickup indicator light.fit bench grinder.spray weeds.make 12vdc power supply.clean shotgun.answer emails.make birdbath.clean boots.

*sigh*

Mind you, it’s slightly less insane than Eugene’s list of things to do.

If you’re living in America, before the end of the year you need to:

1) buy a gun
2) convert your stock and cash to gold and bury it somewhere safe
3) stock up on gas, light bulbs and anything else a leftist might not want you to have.

4) …
5) Profit!!1!

I thought losing my job was bad enough, but then I arrived at the camp and saw this sign.

CHILDRENS CAMP

At least bad punctuation helps put major life events in perspective.

And what is it with little kids (the camp was for kids younger than those I teach in my class) and their complete inability to look after themselves? Why can’t they HTFU and be a little more independent?

KID: Scott, someone stole my torch!

SCOTT: I’m sure nobody stole it. You’ve probably just lost it.

KID: No! Somebody stole it!

SCOTT: When was the last time you saw it?

KID: At home when my mum packed it in my bag.

SCOTT: Okay, so have you looked in your bag?

KID: Yeah. Not there.

SCOTT: (Opening bag and finding torch right at top) Is this it?

KID: They must have put it back. * cries *

I’ve also been utterly and completely out of the news loop. What did I miss?

Political Lizard:

So sa (sic) we start this election We (sic) see that Obama starts off with approximately 36.8 million votes and McCain starts with 36.6 million votes. This is a 200,000 vote lead prior to independents being included. If these voters are evenly split We (sic) could have a situation where one candidate wins the popular vote and another wins the electoral college. A split in independents favors McCain. If McCain maintains his slight lead among independent (sic) he wins similar to 2004.

ChronWatch:

Obama’s biggest problem is that the majority of Americans racially are white. Even Hispanics, racially, are white. Once you get by all the usual politically correct blather about race, the likelihood that whites will vote for Obama is slim to none when they get in the privacy of the voting booth.

That is why John McCain, unless he selects a serial killer as his vice president running mate, is likely to be the next President of the United States of America.

When queeried (sic) on what he meant by this, the intrepid poster expanded upon this thesis:

The vast majority of homosexuals are atheist and liberal. That is a
fact. Also journalism is a favorite career path of homosexuals and
socialists.
Journalists are like lawyers. They create their own job via paper and
bullshit. Both are human barnacles on society that produce nothing of value.

Edward David Gil (cached, original deleted):

Here is how “the penny dropped” and I suddenly realized that McCain will beat Obama decisively in this November’s presidential election (as unlikely as it may seem now in July): it was when I read that the city of Denver has been giving the Democratic National Committee’s “Host Committee” members a pass on the city’s tax on gasoline for about four months, before it was disclosed.

Daily AntiKos

Reasons why:
1. Conservatives don’t participate in polls.
2. People have felt intimidated into saying they’re supporting Obama.
3. Sarah Palin will produce a turnout of the base as never seen before.
4. Coal states have shifted toward McCain.
5. God is conservative.

Owned. Every last one.

The chorus went a little something like this:

So tell me
Why should I let you go
Give me twenty good reasons
I need to know

Twenty. Presumably this means if the ex only managed to come up with 19 bulletproof reasons for hating this fellow’s guts, he’d politely decline her request to be free of him and continue stalking her.

Sounds perfectly reasonable to me. Surely anyone who’d write a song about not being able to accept that a relationship is over is bound to be a top bloke and a good catch. Hell, the missus just probably never truly appreciated how much he adored her and how lucky she was — the ungrateful, aloof cow!

But then, today, I googled the lyrics of the chorus and discovered the song was by the hilariously named Thirsty Merc:

Suddenly I understood that one good reason was all the justification she’d ever need:

Rai, my dear, you have a moustache that looks as though you’ve dropped your dessert spoon at the Coogee Bay Hotel and thought: “You know what? To hell with it. I’m just going to eat this complimentary gelato with my face.”

As such, I find the very thought of touching you repugnant and would sooner engage in sexual congress with a frightened echidna than spend another minute in your company.

Now please, get out of my hydrangeas. And take that fucking guitar with you.

As for me, I’ll be spending the weekend toasting democracy with some more (possibly French) bubbly. Formidable!

In this new world, Australia has many advantages… We have great resources as a civil society with a tradition of generosity and support. To compete well and use our human capital to the best, we will have to draw on these advantages and make our country stronger. That means being… more trusting in our creativity and our competence.

What Rupe does:

Mr Murdoch flagged job cuts at News Corp operations in Australia and Britain… “You will see even leaner operations in both those places (Australia and Britain),” he said during the group’s first-quarter results briefing. “I’m not prepared to say how many people. I know, but I don’t want the headlines about it … but expect across-the-board cuts.”

Read the transcript of the first of the Boyer Lectures, if you have time, it’s a masterly concoction of cloying nationalistic cliches and paternalistic bullshit. Watch Rupert jump from gloating about the Russell Drysdale painting he has on his office in New York - to saying “what you make of yourself is more important than where you came from”.  Hear him reminisce about the heady days at Geelong Grammar (which he chooses not to mention by name) then slam public education as being “19th century” - because we’re spending too much. And listen to his pledge to make News ‘carbon-neutral’ by 2010 with “the talents and creativity of all our employees to meet that goal” (Timmeh and Bolta, are you boys listening?)

Whilst a McCain victory would be extraordinary, I’m sure leftists would blame it on the dubious “Bradley factor” [whites naming Obama in polling but bawking at voting for him on the day].

Political pundit and confused anthropomorphist, Leon ‘Splastic’ Bertrand, on Tuesday evening:

Many in the left and most blacks voted for Obama because of his race, and a minority of folks would have voted against him because he is black.

In other words, if Obama had lost then it wouldn’t have been down to racialist voting by whites. But Obama won because of - wait for it - racialist voting by teh Left and his fellow blacks. And “most blacks” vote according to race - but only a “minority of [white] folks” do.

And my question is this: “where’s your evidence, Q-Bert, you racist little sphincter?”

This is… a seven-part in-depth look behind the scenes of the campaign, consisting of exclusive behind-the-scenes reporting from the McCain and Obama camps assembled by a special team of reporters who were granted year-long access on the condition that none of their findings appear until after Election Day.

I highly recommend that you pour a glass of single malt, put your feet up, and enjoy an article so long that Newsweek calls it “The Book”.

“I think that will just encourage those who want to completely destabilize and destroy Iraq, and create chaos and a victory for the terrorists to hang on and hope for an Obama victory”

“America has elected a man who may well be a Taqqiya-breathing Muslim, posing as a Christian. Under the cloak of darkness, clouds have been gathering in the Middle East. How will an America under Obama respond to the growing tensions gravitating around Israel?”

“…”

“[The media] created Obama. They could have destroyed him in a minute if they had wanted to. Instead they promoted him, covered for him and used anything they could to discredit his opponents.”

“$600 million at last count, yeah it was such a battle over there on struggle street folks, however did he manage it on the small ‘change’ he had. If that isn’t buying an election I’m not quite sure what is.”

UPDATE:

“Drover’s Dog Wins”

Many conservatives - including Tim Blair - managed to be gracious in the face of this historic shift. Even John McCain - who was utterly thrashed - was able to make a pretty moving speech that acknowledged the importance of Obama’s victory. Fair play to all of them.

But you may be asking yourselves: on such an auspicious day, is there any way for an Australian conservative to turn this into an attack on the filthy habits of teh left? Could the election of Obama possibly be tarnished by associating it with something eee-vil? Come on down, Miranda Devine.

Barack Obama’s autobiography, Dreams From My Father, describes his flirtation with drugs during a troubled early period. “Pot had helped, and booze; maybe a little blow [cocaine] when you could afford it … Everybody was welcome into the club of disaffection.” At 47, the US president-elect is typical of his late baby boomer-early generation X cohort, in that marijuana was freely available in his teens and early 20s, virtually unpoliced and regarded as relatively harmless, a “soft” drug.

Oh noes! Snoop Dogg has been elected President! What can it all mean?

As the pot-smoking generations have moved en masse into positions of power, the days when reporters could play gotcha journalism with politicians about previous drug use are over.

Oh noes! The bong-zombies are in charge of the crack-house! And there’s nothing that our totally clean-living Fourth Estate can do to save us! What can it all mean?

While marijuana use may have lost much of its political sting, politicians should… heed mounting evidence that marijuana is not the benign drug it was once thought. If anything, their experience gives them the moral authority to ensure young people, particularly adolescents, with their exquisitely vulnerable brains, understand that cannabis is increasingly linked to permanent psychiatric damage.

So, politicians need to be straight up with the kids: “Marijuana is a gateway drug that can lead to other things, like being the President of the United States or Leader of the Parliamentary Liberal Party. But if you Just Say No, you can dream instead of writing bizarre, obsessive, mean-spirited and irrelevant newspaper columns”.

Of course, that message is unlikely to come loud and clear from psychotic Gen X weedheads like the POTUS-elect.

But for those aged over 40, cannabis use increased, especially among the over-50s, reflecting the ageing of the pothead generation. It is this generation, now in positions of influence, who are proving dangerously resistant to changing their youthful notions about cannabis.

As they’re having their breakfast buckets on the first dawn of this new era, the Obamas should have a good read of Miranda’s column. They will, like, totally piss themselves, dude.

Ting-Tong then proclaims that:

Hoagy [Hoegh-Guldberg] is a crook.

Which itself is quite ironic, since the not-so-good doctor stole that double-page scan from here at Google Books (you can even see his search terms still highlighted). The terms of reference at Google Books state that users may preview text, not copy, save or print it. Maybe Ting-Tong PhD didn’t notice that, much like he accidentally cropped this out of his original scan:

Careful Doc - when Teh Left brings in Sharia law, you’ll have your hands scythed off for that.

The sweet, sweet taste of third place

Mmmm…. tandoori chicken.

Ding ding! Noon strikes. I log off, get up, bid a temporary farewell to Tim the page-sub who looks like William H. Macy. Down the corridor, around the corner, into the staffroom anticipation building. Open the fridge and…

Gone.

I hope you fucking choked on it, you cowardly, inconsiderate, thieving sack of horse shit!

P.S. Some black guy won the presidency.

Democrat Barack Obama stands on the verge of becoming the first black US president, after capturing key states Ohio and Pennsylvania to leave Republican John McCain a near-impossible route to the presidency.

Bron, Michelle and countless other filthy lefties are trembling with anticipation at the Democrat’s likely victory, but I’m trembling with anticipation at MK’s post at A Western Heart after B. Hussein Obama is handed the keys to the White House. Just look at the venom in his latest post about a Muslim illegal immigrant in Britain who killed somebody in a car accident and won’t be deported by authorities.

Oh poor baby, how terrible, I mean what’s up with you bloody xenophobic people, what have you got against immigrants. They have human rights you know, don’t get me wrong, Pakistan is a wonderful place, all cultures are equal and all that, but social services are pretty bad out there. There isn’t a lot of social and economic justice there you know. So it would be too much for Laura and baby to move there and make a life over there. Waiter, I’ll have my regular, decaf-soy-chai-whatever-the-heck-stupid-leftists-drink thanks.

For serious, the reaction of AWH-and-friends to Obama’s win is going to be the spectator sport of the year. Full coverage on Grods tomorrow.

I’ve always like George W. Bush. And I’m going to miss him when he leaves the White House to make room for Barack Obama, who will win tomorrow.

Okay, I hated Dubya for his war “policies”, Guantanamo Bay, Dick Cheney, his so-called “faith-based initiatives”, his indifference to his own citizens who struggled daily for basic rights like health and education, and so on.

But I sure as hell loved his horribly mangled grammar, his ability to say some of the most stupid things that does not befit the President of the United States, and his lack of embarrassment — or complete unwareness — at what he’d said.

I’ve cringed and sniggered and often laughed out loud at Dubya’s bloopers. I’ve watched The Letterman Show whenever I could just for the “Great Moments in Presidential Speeches” segment.

So, with his impending departure from the White House, I’d like to take a look back at some of my favourite things he’s said in the last 7-8 years, for posterity (and in no particular order, there was a lot to sift through). The quotes are from the excellent DubyaSpeak.com website, who have done an amazing job “recording the damage” over the years.

• I can press when there needs to be pressed. I can hold hands when there needs to be — hold hands. — January 6, 2008
• I know what I believe. I will continue to articulate what I believe and what I believe - I believe what I believe is right. — July 22, 2001
• It is naive and dangerous to take a policy that he suggested the other day, which is to have bilatarelations with North Korea. — October 8, 2004
• I don’t like to put words in leaders’ mouths. I don’t particularly like it when people put words in my mouth, either, by the way, unless I say it. — November 10, 2007
• It reads like a mystery, a novel. It’s well written. — July 26, 2004 (pertaining to the 9/11 Commission’s report)
• She is a fabulous First Lady. I was a lucky man when she said, yes, I agree to marry you. I love her dearly, and I’m proud of the job she’s doing on behalf of all Americans. Just like I love my brother. — September 9, 2003
• The Ambassador and the General were briefing me on the — the vast majority of Iraqis want to live in a peaceful, free world. And we will find these people and we will bring them to justice. — October 27, 2003
• You know, I’m — I’ve been in politics long enough to know that polls just go poof at times. — April 19, 2007
• That’s George Washington, the first president, of course. The interesting thing about him is that I read three — three or four books about him last year. Isn’t that interesting? — May 5, 2006
• It’s a myth to think I don’t know what’s going on. And it’s a myth to think that I’m not aware that there is opinions that don’t agree with mine. Because I’m fully aware of that. …I see a lot of the news. Every morning I look at the newspaper I can tell you what the headlines are. I must confess, if I think the story is, like, not a fair appraisal, I’ll move on. — December 12, 2005
• I want to thank my friend, Senator Bill Frist, for joining us today. You’re doing a heck of a job. You cut your teeth here, right? That’s where you started practicing? That’s good. He married a Texas girl, I want you to know. Karyn is with us. A West Texas girl, just like me. — May 27, 2004
• I love the story of America, I love the fact that people who started with nothing and have built a fantastic food processing business. — October 14, 2003
• There’s no need for any unrestrained yelling. — July 30, 2003
• REPORTER: Do you think you would be able to work effectively with a future Australian leader, be it either a successor of Mr. Howard from his own party, or from their opposition?
  DUBYA: Well, I suspect he’s going to outlast me, so that is a moot point. Probably a question you ought to ask him. Somebody said, you and John Howard appear to be so close, don’t you have any differences? And I said, yes, he doesn’t have any hair. — May 16, 2006
• We can help somebody who hurts by hugging a neighbor in need. — April 4, 2003
• First we talked about the bridge that collapsed. I was here earlier, saw the collapse first hand. I was impressed by the magnitude of the problem. It was — my heart was touched by the fact that people lost their lives. — August 21, 2007
• We have overcome a recession. That means things are going backwards. — March 26, 2004
• Rarely is the question asked, are, is our children learning? — January 11, 2000
• I’m the master of low expectations. — June 4, 2003
  
• Nobody has accused me of having a real sophisticated vocabulary. — October 11, 2006

Feel free to add your favourite Dubya quotes, as we begin to farewell Dubya with joy.

Now if all you peasants could just get on your knees and chant ‘long live the king’, the great messiah might throw you some scraps from his chariot procession. And while you’re bent over in awe and worship, get those wallets out folks, a lot of people have been promised a lot of things by the great King Barack, so somebody’s got to pay for all this crap you know.

Yep folks this is what you vote for fascist socialists, eh, it’s as simple as that. You peasants who worship at the feet of Obama will pay, cos he ain’t the Messiah he seems, folks. Have, I, used, enough, commas, yet, folks? And while you’re all wondering how I can write so incoherently, well, why are we punishing the rich for being successful, eh.

1) Champion goalkeeper Ant Rogenous isn’t playing due to “other commitments”, whatever that means; and

2) I’m playing, and I’ve missed every GTFC victory due to “other commitments” or injury, causing my teammates to wonder aloud if my presence at matches is a bad omen.

Place yer bets in comments and wish us luck. Match report later.

UPDATE: A glorious GroupThinkFC victory: 8-7. Suck shit, Emos.

What. On. Earth. Were. You. Thinking?

On Saturday at about 5pm — Derby Day — I was riding my bike through the CBD. I was heckled by two carloads of drunken bogans heading into town after the races, and I watched one group of drunk idiots in suits kick shit out of a taxi that dared pick up another group of drunk idiots in suits. Later that evening I was walking along an inner city street that was packed with racegoers getting even drunker in bars, when a slobbering drunkard wearing a tie with horses on it, and carrying a bourbon-and-Coke, tried to grab one of my female companion’s tits.

I know that this sort of stuff goes on basically every night of the week in cities around Australia, but the difference is that the Spring Carnival actively promotes and encourages people to don their best clothes and get spasticated, all in the name of the “sport of kings”. When our laneways turn into “warzones” after 3am because drunk kids roll out of nightclubs and into fights it’s bad, but when adults in suits roll out of Flemington and into the CBD having injected large wads of cash into the racing industry it’s okay.

Patrick Smith thinks so too.

HERE is the awful truth facing racing. It is a party and not a sport, a piss-up and not a business.

Growth is not based on racing’s innate beauty but the capacity to get 110,000 people obnoxiously drunk and utterly distracted.

[...]

So crowds are sought to fill the stands and the lawns at Flemington. To dress up and fall down, to sink beers and throw punches, to fall about in a stupor and not fall in love at all with the sport.

As the field left the mounting yard for the Derby, racing’s new audience could not care less. In front of the mounting yard a group of drunks begin to fight. From toe-to-toe it becomes a chase this way and that. It threatens to spread like a wildfire. Security are slow to arrive, police not at all. No one in the crowd has either the inclination or the strength to stop the stupidity.

[...]

The spring carnival makes money but not converts. The baboons in the crowd would not know a horse from a hearse. The majesty of thoroughbred racing is lost in the bubble of champagne and the dribbling of beer. Racing spends its money not to educate but inebriate and, as such, the most exhilarating sport in the world is not just forgotten but not even seen so as to be appreciated.

As crowds for the spring carnival grow, racing has not found a new audience but merely a new revenue stream. Racing, the entrancing sport of horses, is in danger of drinking itself to death.

Schwarzenegger hit the campaign trail today, criticising … Obama as a weak candidate unable to build up “meat on his ideas”.

“He needs to do something about those skinny legs,” Schwarzenegger said at rally with McCain in Columbus, Ohio.

The former bodybuilder and action movie hero said he would like to see Obama get on a program of “bicep curls to beef up those scrawny little arms”.

I guess Arnie thinks Obama should be someone in his own image:

No thanks.

But we all know Keating’s not slagging anyone off - save perhaps Churchill, the drunken imperialistic old toad - and that factually, he’s quite right about Gallipoli. It was a tragedy for our troops but its elevation above other battles and campaigns is illogical. It wasn’t our first war as a nation: we had close to 20,000 men serve in the Boer War, another British military fuck-up. We didn’t suffer the worst there (France lost a much higher proportion of its troops) nor is it our costliest defeat (six times as many Australians died on the Western Front - and three-quarters as many died in one day’s fighting at Fromelles as did in the entire seven months at Gallipoli). But let’s face it, the rocky beach, the high cliffs, the Muzzies with machine-guns - it all makes for a great yarn, the stuff from which national myths are woven.

None of that will matter to the Gallipophiles, however, who have spent their lives marching to the nationalist drum and getting drunk on CEW Bean or Les Carlyon. The facts of history mean little to those who just want to use it as a euphoric drug.

Familiarity with C#, Linux, Apache, Perl and Python

And I’m thinking “…unless this is a gig reporting on music performance, Snoopy characters, native Americans and the herpetology scene, I may be under-qualified”. Apparently to be an ‘online journalist’ these days you’ve got to be able to hack into the NASA mainframe and re-task the Hubble telescope to read over Bolta’s shoulder through the window of his suite at Docklands. Being able to research, interview, write, spell, proof, edit and format are optional skillz.

I must be a Luddite.

With criticism-worthy nuggets of gold almost certainly hidden somewhere in the reports, you’d be forgiven for expecting Victoria’s broadsheet to do some — um, how you say? — journalism for us. You know, a bit of reading, analysing, questioning and reporting. But this is The Age, remember. That’s not how Fairfax rolls anymore.

You want journalism? Do it yourself.

The work experience kid was too busy writing tomorrow’s editorial to read all 200 reports

WILD wallabies are terrorising a Townsville retirement village, knocking over residents and defecating on lawns and patios.

Residents at Carlyle Gardens are said to be too afraid to leave their homes when the 100-strong mob runs amok in the early mornings and late afternoons.

The wallabies are crashing into cars, scooters and even elderly residents.

Large male wallabies, over a metre tall and weighing up to 30kg, are fighting, falling against the side of homes and damaging walls.

A few things to say about this:

(a) Wild wallabies seem to defecate with abandon, but even they don’t crap in Gelato.

(b) If we weren’t being oppressed by the nanny state and the old people were allowed to carry automatic weapons, this wouldn’t be a problem.

(c) Having lived in North Queensland, I will concede the possibility that this is essentially bullshit - a bunch of wild exaggerations thrown together by a Townsville Bulletin journalist in a late-afternoon frenzy, as they try desperately to respond to the awful grinding reality that once the NRL season is over, there is almost nothing to put in the newspaper.

(d) The photo and header they used are utterly, utterly AWESOME.

The Government must ensure that information on the rights and equality of women remains part of the Citizenship Test, Shadow Minister for Women Sophie Mirabella said today.

[...]

Mrs Mirabella said she had written to the Minister for Immigration the Hon Senator Chris Evans, asking that he ensure the Government includes facts on the rights of women in Australia in the information provided for those undertaking the Citizenship Test and that the subject is included in the multiple choice questions.

Apparently there’s no societal problem that can’t be fixed with a multiple choice question. Let’s see if it works.

First, the two leftists arrested and charged seem to have gone to extraordinary lengths in parodying extreme wingnut racism, just to disprove Tim Blair’s claim that examples of rightards who fear and loathe Obama primarily for the colour of his skin are notoriously “thin on the ground”.

Second, this piece of shit:

is surely the most effeminate Nazi-wannabe since The Sound of Music’s Rolf Gruber.

John is now vainly trying to defend himself in the face of overwhelming criticism, and not doing a very good job. He emailed a “leftist” to bait him into dennoucning the rumour that Trig is really Bristol Palin’s child. Instead of defending this scurrilous rumour, as John expects all “leftists” should, the “leftist” in question hadn’t even heard of it.

When however I wrote back to one of the Leftists and said that I assumed that he also was outraged by the false claims about Sarah Palin’s family (claims that Trig was really her daughter’s baby etc., etc.) he didn’t even know what I was talking about.

Um. That would be a good thing, right? But no. In John’s “brilliant” mind, the “leftist” in question is a deficient person for not even hearing of this rumour. He’s probably not even a member of the communist party. What a fraud.

John continues with his mind-blowing theories of how the photographs reached the internet:

So who did put up the pictures originally? I think they got onto the net via a bulletin board, one of the predecessors of the internet. Bulletin boards had LOTS of pictures of nude women. The photographer is the logical one to have uploaded them and Frank Marshall Davis died in 1987 — well inside the lifetime of bulletin boards.

A theory that is so clever and precise and darn logical, he could have only used the world’s foremost supercomputer to assist him.

Clearly, John ’s not the genius he portrays himself as. How bizarre that he is so keen to believe one false rumour about Obama’s mother, and yet decries the false rumours about Trig’s true parentage. Of course, John’s thought process is to form an opinion first, and seek facts later. He always allows his political beliefs to get in the way of rational thought. This is why he is held in such low regard throughout the internet, and the world.

We leftists have a word for people like him.

Hypocrite.

What Are Teachers Being Taught?

Schools have been told to go “back to basics” with English grammar lessons, but it’s universities that need to pick up their game.

Read the whole article at newmatilda.com.

50 000 Years Eh? But, Still Dreaming and not even a ½ decent dunny to show for it.
The place is full of every metal one can dream of but not so much as a metal fishhook or metal spearhead has ever been found…
– JV of North Essendon

Teh Aboriginals: pwned.

But one exchange in particular is especially funny and is an extreme case study in idiocy.

Sure, no culture is perfect, but would anyone actually choose to be born Aboriginal or Muslim? Both cultures treat women as dirt and have the death penalty for trivialities. Both cultures have produced nothing worthwhile even after thousands of years, so if Aboriginal culture is so superior, how come there’s nothing to show for it? Oh, I guess that’s because the horrible whites destroyed it.
– lethal of WA

Rachel replied to lethal:
but would anyone actually choose to be born Aboriginal or Muslim?

More to the point, why would anyone choose to be born white? It seems to me, especially from your views, that it must be horribly limiting intellectually.

Nemesis12 replied to lethal:
More to the point, why would anyone choose to be born white?

*gentle smile*

Rachel..no one “chooses” to be born. That’s sorta out of their control, y’know?

davo of the Krudd Empire replied to lethal:
“More to the point, why would anyone choose to be born white? It seems to me, especially from your views, that it must be horribly limiting intellectually.”

What a racist comment.

(Thanks to notallright for the link.)

As part of getting to know the extreme Left quite well, I also used to attend meetings in Brisbane of the Australia-Soviet friendship society.

Conservative blogger, Leon Bertrand QC, has dabbled with socialism for “research”.

I… often went out of my way to understand the views of others, including those of the extreme left. To the point where I actually once attended a meeting of the loony left fringe group Socialist Alternative.

I think I’m going to go along to a Young Liberals meeting. Just for research, mind.

But this, while being totally expected, just bejokens a joke of a man to brand new depths of jokeness.

Family First Senator Steve Fielding wants hardcore pornography and fetish material blocked under the Government’s plans to filter the internet… But asked to specify the categories of content that Senator Fielding would like blocked by the mandatory first tier, a Family First spokeswoman indicated the party would want X-rated and refused classification (RC) content banned for everyone, including adults.

Who. The. Fuck. Does. This. Guy. Think. He. Is?

How dare Steve fucking Fielding fucking try to tell me what legal content I can and can’t download on my Interweb? What sort of (dare I say?) God complex has taken hold of this man? I mean, Steve Fielding — apart from attempting to seriously curtail my personal freedom — is suggesting that the government compulsorily block my access to about 95% of the Internerds (the other 5% is lolcats.)

Fuck you, Steve Fielding. And the 1.8% you rode in on.

And it doesn’t.

The short version of the story, just in case any Andrew Bolt readers have stumbled by (we all know you imbeciles don’t bother reading links), is that a woman kicked up a fuss over seating at a pub function and was allegedly given a free bowl of poo-smeared ice cream as a “placatory gesture”.

I worked in the hospitality industry for many years and saw some horrendous things (and heard of worse) … but this despicable act would take the chocolates, so to speak.

Anyway, here’s the bit that really impressed me:

Ms Whyte said she realised something was amiss when she brought a spoonful to her lips and “the stench went through my nostrils”.

“I retched and spat it out into the napkin,” she told News Ltd.

Notice the missing sentence between those two? I imagine it went something like this:

“SO I TOOK A BITE ANYWAY…”

Fair. Fucking. Dinkum. What would have to have been on this woman’s ice cream to dissuade her from putting a spoonful into her gob?

I don’t mind going to dentist. I’ll take whatever kind of pampering that I can. I don’t understand why some people hate going to the dentists — it’s not that bad. Is it?

Anyway, I had to get some fillings. So, I’m lying back on the surprisingly comfortable patient’s chair with my head resting on the surprisingly comfortable but noisy plastic pillow, my jaws wide apart as far as they could go with many bits of probing metal sticks and mirrors and whatnot in my mouth.

It was impossible to talk, obviously.

And thus you’d think a dentist would know that, wouldn’t you? You’d think they’d explain all their tools that they’re going to stick in your mouth (I realise some of you might see a rude joke in there) and discuss any possible pain or discomfort, before you’re pretty much voiceless.

Not this dentist. Rob. He tells me these things after I’m rendered literally speechless.”This is a laser light that will super charge water particles in dental tissues… Understand?”

Lying there on my back, mouth gaping wide open, I try to respond that no, I have no fucking idea what he’s on about, but I don’t care, just get those fillings in. As it is impossible to tell him this, I make a gurgled sound like “gnnhk” and slightly nod my head.

“Good. And this red light is the laser, it’s not harmful and won’t hurt your tissue,” he continues. “See the red light?”

Again, I can’t respond vocally, and also I can’t even see what fucking red light he’s talking about, because he had it out of my line of sight, the dopey bastard. I raise my head slightly, look down and peer beyond those ugly black glasses they make you wear and see the red light beaming out of some metal electronic stick he’s holding. I try to answer “Yes, I see it now!” but not only am I still rendered voiceless, I am also unable to convey my sarcasm that was growing rapidly. Again, I just nod slightly and make a noise, “gerrrnk”.

Then he holds up something else and says, in a slightly awed voice, “And this is similar to the traditional dentist drill, except it’s not. That’s why we don’t need to use anaesthetics, as this is groundbreaking laser dentristy work! It’s not radioactive either!”

By then, I’m ready to plead for anaesthetic, just to numb me from my aching jaw, my dry throat and lips, my inability to respond as well as my inability to tell him to get a fucking move on!

Then there’s a knock on the door, and it’s the other dentist, with a small “emergency” on a patient he’s working. Rob apologises, he and his dental nurse withdraw all their objects from my mouth and he rushes off into the other dental room. Gingerly, I close my jaws shut, try to find some saliva from somewhere and lie there, traumatised already with nothing actually being done yet to my teef.

Rob comes back shortly and asks, “Now, want me to go through any of that again?”

You fucking bastard, I thought. Now you ask, when I have the ability to speak. “No, I’m OK. Let’s begin, shall we?” I suggest politely.

And 30 minutes later, I was out of there, with two new fillings, $355 poorer and a newfound pathological hatred for dentists.

Although, I’m not sure they’ve really thought this through.

With the bottle’s cap removed, one’s eye is drawn towards the bold shaft design