This Sarah Palin woman frightens me

O.K. 8 years of an astonishingly ignorant, inarticulate dickwad for a US president and now the Americans are being wooed by an equally idiotic politician; only this time the candidate wears a skirt and she’s going for the 2.i.c. job. A big problem is that the Republican presidential candidate is a decrepit old man who could keel over any minute, leaving the moosehunter in charge. For goodness’ sake people, this woman is dangerous! She claims Alaska’s proximity to Russia gives her an edge on foreign policy!

What it comes down to though (in my sagely wisdom) is the blinkered vision of an unfortunately significant proportion of American voters. Alas the influence of that distinctively American brand of showy, political, evangelical Christianity (adopted here by Hill$ong and the like) means that the “leader/s of the free world” are usually elected on the basis of their stance on comparatively inconsequential matters such as their views on women’s reproductive rights, gun laws or gay marriage. To hell with the fact (to borrow from the American parlance), that these candidates have no foreign policy or economic management credentials. Never mind that they’ve never travelled and seen the world – either as emissaries or private travellers. So long as they oppose abortion on the one hand and promise unfettered access to guns on the other, they get sufficient votes from the rabid religious right to get elected. Then as we’ve seen from Sideshow-Bush, they carry on in a most UNchristian manner once in office by declaring wars, feathering the nests of the rich and powerful and ignoring or abandoning the poor and poweless. Ah…but they make all the right noises about defenceless embyos so they must be God’s elected representative. (Never mind the defenseless embryos – and men, women and children – killed in the carnage of the unjust wars and crusades they’ve fought).

This quote from the Sydney Morning Herald sums it all up:

However, for some analysts, Palin’s limited experience in foreign affairs is unlikely to affect her support among the rank-and-file Republican base, which responds to her staunchly conservative views on abortion, guns and religion.

“The party base doesn’t care about foreign policy, so it should not be too much of a concern,” said Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a political analyst at the University of Southern California.

God Bless America – as they say – and God help the rest of us if Grandpa and the Moosehunter win the election in November.

If there was a “straight pill”…

…I wouldn’t take it. I still sometimes find myself reflecting on my “struggles” as a young gay church-goer 10 or 15 years ago. I cringe at the futile and ill-fated attempts to turn straight. If I knew then what I know now about the rightness and freedom of accepting my sexual identity, the joy, security, love and satisfaction that my 7 year (and counting) relationship has brought, then I most certainly wouldn’t have put myself through the torture of trying to deny such an intrinsic part of my being.

We went to a really fun and interesting party last night. After my recent rant about the rotten state of the gay scene in Sydney, it was so refreshing to be at an event that had a kind of more underground, friendly, non-meat-market feel. The event I refer to was called Non-Scene, A Winter Solstice. The venue was a bar called the Loft at UTS on Broadway. As the event’s name would suggest, the crowd was a bit different to the normal gay bar scene. There was very little preening and posing. There was very little sleazy cruising going on. Apart from a few joints being passed around, beer was about the only drug in evidence. It was just a congregation of couple of hundred people of every gender imaginable (and then some), misfits, friends and lovers and a very funny interpretive dance/mime routine set to Hotel California.

What has a good night out got to do with being queer? Well a lot really. At these kinds of events I always find myself thinking how fortunate I am to view society from outside the mainstream. To be in a room full of other “outsiders” where there is acceptance of diversity and where creativity and individuality can be expressed without fear of ridicule or judgement. Where men can walk around in frocks and makeup if they so choose. Where women can wear a tux and army boots. Two boys can kiss in one corner while two girls grope in another and none of this behaviour turns heads. Let and let live is the reigning philosophy.

I think of the millions of folk in whitebread suburban homes watching So-you-think-you-are-an-Australian-big-idol’s-dancing-brother or whatever inane shit is on channel ten these days. I also find myself thinking of the repression of sex and sexuality that mainstream western culture still imposes, and am thankful to be part of a community that challenges those norms. I’m glad to be able to dance like a lunatic if I want to. (There is something primeval and essentially human about dancing – maybe that is the “earth sign Taurus” in me speaking). Even though most of the people at these events are strnagers, there is a bond as we shrug off the mantle of the outside world and celebrate together.

Being an outsider in day to day life, as I move though the mainstream, I also think is advantageous – at least in a society like Australia where there is at least a modicum of tolerance for “my tribe”. I can see things from angles that others perhaps struggleto. I can empathise with other outsiders in the community. I think to be a gay man with my feminine and masculine sides in ying-yang-like balance is like being psychologically ambidextrous. There is balance.

True, these things are not the exclusive domain(s) of queer folk – far from it; but I would argue that if I were straight, I would be far less likely to be exposed to such alternative ways of thinking and living. And even if I was exposed to them, I wonder whether perhaps I would have inherited sufficient societal predjudices as to make me discount such experiences as the folly of complete fruitloops. I would also concede that there are many many gay men and women who wouldn’t identify with the sort of scene baba and I enjoyed and felt such an affinity with last night (and at other events like Kooky and Tropical Fruits at new year). Horses for courses. But even those in the thick of mainstream gay, those who pimp and preen and go to Oxford street venues several times a week, week in week out, those who get emotional watching Will and Grace, those who ring up and vote for the token gay “character” on the latest reality TV show, those who love their broadway tunes, and all the other cliches (some of which I must admit to holding dear), even those folk are set aside from their heterosexual bretheren by the very fact that biology has made them (us) different.

Here endeth the lesson

Just for good measure, here is Yet Another Article on the loonies over at Mercy Ministries. Interestingly, it has been reported that a significant number of companies have withdrawn their sponsorship of the cult and distanced themselves altogether.

John Howard is SO wrong!

Here is a speech he gave yesterday to an audience of like-minded, narrow-minded, blinkered conservatives in America. perhaps he should move to the USA seeing as there are so many more loony conservative audiences to listen to the prattlings of a redundant man. There are just so many holes that can be cut through his argument below as to why the Australian government didn’t owe and apology to the Stolen Generation. Read and weep.

WHAT I said in my speech was that substance was more important than symbolism but that symbolism can be important and was important in its own right.

I was prime minister for 11½ years and I declined on behalf of the then Australian government to sponsor an apology of the type given by the new Australian Government, and I did so for three reasons.

The first is that I do not believe as a matter of principle that one generation can accept responsibility for the acts of earlier generation. I don’t accept that as a matter of principle.

My second reason was that the circumstances of the removal of indigenous children were not uniform. In some cases children were wrongly removed; in other cases they were removed for good reason; in other cases they were given up; and in other cases, the judgment on the removal is obscure or difficult to make.

That was a view that was expressed very strongly a few weeks ago by somebody I regard as probably the voice of contemporary indigenous Australia more than anybody else – Noel Pearson of the Cape York indigenous council. He expressed that view.

The third reason I expressed the view is that when you do something like that there is a psychological reaction that the indigenous problems have been “ticked”, and the commitment to do practical things such as reducing the gap between the life expectancy of indigenous Australians and other Australians – which is unacceptably high – and those sort of things are pushed into the background.

There is a broader issue … I think Australia went through a period of 20 or 30 years of failed policies in relation to indigenous affairs. I think we persevered for too long with the notion of separate development.

I think the only way the indigenous people of Australia can get what we call a fair go is for them to become part of the mainstream of the community and get the benefits and opportunities available from mainstream society, while always recognising – which I believe you can do consistent with the benefits of mainstream Australia – the particular and special place of the indigenous culture in the life of the country.

This is an edited version of comments by John Howard after his speech to the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University.

(From smh.com.au)

Election frenzy

So the Prince of Darkness has called the election. Hopefully he’ll be PM no more after 24 November. Though we’ve been here before. Somehow he brainwashes all the mum and dad voters in the burbs that their comfortable existence will suddenly be lost if any party left of Mussolini gets voted into power in this country…and Rudd’s labor is fractionally to the left of Mussolini….probably somewhere around Thatcher.

Howard has won previous elections based on fear generated by Asian Invasions (think late ’90s Pauline Hanson), Nasty, dangerous refugees (Tampa AND Children overboard), scare mongering about a terrorist threat which was negligable before he took the country to an illegal and immoral war and is probably still not all that much of a real threat despite dire warnings on our fridge magnets and bus stop ads. Then there’s all the bleating on and on about the economy.

Screw the “economy”. If we have so much money floating around, why do I get approached by destitute and homeless people begging for coins every time I pop out the front door to go to the supermarket? Why are public hospitals and schools so desperately underfunded while the private sectors are getting fistfulls of cash? Why are Australian Universties among the lowest funded out of all OECD countries? Why are 19th centrury polluting industries still being propped up and encouraged while “alternative” energy entrepreneurs are making millions selling wind power technologies to the Chinese and solar energy technology to the Germans (Yes, solar power to Germany!!!) and Californians. There’s plenty of money to build freeways, but nothing to fix the railways – not so much as a band aid.

Then there’s the conservative social agenda. Refugees are turned away en-masse. Would-be citizens are condescended by making them remember obscure facts to pass a meaningless test about Don Bradman, the National Anthem and Wattle plants. Howard discovers at the 11th hour that polls suggest people think his performance on Indigenous issues is well below par, but still can’t bring himself to say sorry to the original owners of the land for past injustices.

Closer to home, a recent Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission report identified 58 pieces of federal legislation which disadvantage same-sex couples – some in contravention of UN standards on Human Rights. When the report was released, there were some rumblings within government ranks that they would pass laws to eradicate all 58 barriers to equality. Howard put a stop to such pinko-commie tommfoolery. I can imagine the cynical conversation behind closed doors. The poofters and lezzos are only 5-10% of the population, and probably don’t vote for us anyway. We’re much better off courting to loopy, happy clappy Christian extremist vote if we have any chance of covering our political asses – pun intended. Labor has made a few half hearted promises to deal with the legislation, but they’re ruling out civil unions, let alone marriage for us.

A pox on both their houses I say.

The final word can go to drag uber-personality Vanessa Wagner who wrote this week in the Sydney Star Observer:

“This neo-con, capitalist interface we call government is a blight on civility, justice and culture. When this government is ousted – and they will be shortly – we may look back at this epoch as porous, perverted and tragic, for all Australians are not better off.”

War on Democracy

I went and saw the abovementioned John Pilger film this afternoon. For those not in the know, it details the shady, shonky and downright F**ked up actions of Uncle Sam in removing democratically elected governments in Latin America who refuse to play the game, and replacing them with right-wing dictators who are happy to allow their countries (and any disenting citizens) to be raped and pillaged by america, its military, its biased media, its secret agents and its big companies.

There were laugh-out-loud moments when some absolute tool of a CIA person denied the thousands of deaths of disneters that occured in Pinochet’s Chile, not tomention the United State’s involvement in the torture and countless deaths. When confronted with the evidence, he took on the all too familiar Machiavellian “our national interests and security” line. And according to this man, he in all seriousness believes that Amnesty International is part of an international anti-american propaganda conspiracy. moron.

I would draw similarities between this film and Noam Chomsky’s excellent book Hegemony or Survival which also delves into America’s long term and deliberate empire-building ambitions (in the more palatable guise of spreading democracy) to protect its economic prosperity over and above all else – including peace, human rights and morality.

APEC is stoopid

As I type Condeleza Rice is blowing pre-scripted hot air on Lateline, saying nothing meaningful at all. The yanks brought over 600 people, several planes, helicopters, lots of big cars and hoons with guns. According to a report in today’s paper, the carbon emissions from the american APEC delegation, here for 4 or 5 days is equivalent to the annual carbon output of 2000 typical Sydney-siders. Baba has to carry id and a letter from his company to be able to get to work which is inside the security fence which surrounds the Northern end of the city. The village idiot is staying in a hotel just across the road from his office tower so helicopters and fighter jets are overhead 24/7. I waited 40 minutes for a bus to work this morning. A school girl burst into tears when she found that when the bus finally arrived, it terminated at a junction well before her school. The whole thing is a fucking disgrace. Demonstrators have been told they can’t protest peacefully on public streets. The NSW police have bought a water cannon. The price of capsicums has mysteriously gone up! Snipers are positioned on rooftops.

The “leader of the free world” has come to town and we’re all imprisoned.

The “terrorists” have won. Our freedom and innocence has been taken away.

The utter hypocrisy of it all as they talk in platitudes about “aspirational” targets for peace, erradication of poverty and confronting climate change sicken me and should sicken any right minded person.

Far be it from me to condone violence, but someone should shoot the lot of them.

they call it culcha…

…the theatre that is. Through a convoluted chain of events, I got a couple of free tickets to go and see Who’s Afraid of Viginia Woolf up the road at Belvoir street Theatre the other night. It was an excellent show. I’d read the play years ago in high school and enjoyed it, and seen the film at that time too, but this was the first time I’d seen it on stage. I’m not a theatre critic, so I won’t attempt to review the show, apart from saying I found this particular portrayal of George to be rather Hanibal Lector-esque in demeanour and particularly in the slightly odd pan-Atlantic accent he had going on. All the other actors did it in plain old Strine – something quite rare for this play when performed in this country apparently.

for a proper review, follow this link to the Sydney Morning Herald: SMH review

In other news, baba and i have almost finished preparing all the necessary documents to finalise his permanent residency application (round 2). In this second round we have to prove that we’re still a dull, boring married couple now that two years have passed since the initial provisional permanent residency was granted. It basically means a couple of stat decs from various friends/family and sending off photos, gas bills, tennancy agreements and other things that supposedly verify that we’re a couple. Fortunately in this country which is now a hotbed of evil right-wing conservatism, immigration is one of the very few areas of law in which same-sex couples have any equality. We may be treated as second class citizens before the law, but at least we’re can be together!

What i like best about my new job…

…is the fact that I can finish work at 4:30. I have the option of working 8:30 – 4:30 or 9 to 5. By a peculiar whim of quantum physics I only need to tear myself out of bed 5 minutes earlier in order to get to work at half eight instead of 9:00 and I get to walk out at half past 4. Somehow a 4:30 finish is hugely liberating. I’m looking forward to summer when daylight saving and warm weather kicks in and I can jump on a bus from the University and be at Coogee beach for an afternoon dip by quarter to 5.

Working with nice people and not having to deal with law students is also nice (have i mentioned those things before??)

I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned that baba and I plan to go to Kerala in India again later in the year…
…Unfortunately, i’m very pissed off tonight with United Airlines. According to their (impossible to negotiate) website, it costs 60k miles to get from Syndey to India in business class on Star aliance partner airlines. I rang them the other week to confirm this. The woman on the other end of the phone in a call centre somewhere on Mars with a thick quasi-american accent said “yes sirrrrrr it’s 60 000 miles from Sydney to Bangalorrrre India via Singaporrrrre on Singaporrrrre airrrrlines sirrrrr.” I promptly purchased around 30k “top up” miles for around $1000 thinking i was getting a bargain to be able to fly business class for less than it would ordinarily cost to buy an economy class ticket. Tonight I rang their call centre on Mars again and was told by another martian with a fake american accent that it costs 75k miles because the flight to India involves a stopover in Singapore which is in a more expensive “zone”. Long story short, I spoke to a supervisorrrr who refused to budge. I asked If I could get a refund for the $1000 I’d paid to buy miles and give my cash directly to Singapore Airlies instead. She of course rattled off the usual line about purchases being non-refundable and suggested that I could try sending an email which will be answered “within seven days” requesting a refund in my special circumstances.

Well fiddlesticks, poo, bum, wee, knickers, bollocks and tits!!!!! I’ll keep you posted on the success or otherwise of my appeal.

Finally while I write this, my hero, positively pinko-bolshy Journalist Tony Jones, is on telly tearing shreds off the completely evil right-wing doco “The Global Warming Swindle” – the film which tries to debunk the scientific consensus which says that people are screwing with the planet and it’s environment.

Here endeth the lesson.

Oh P.S. New favourite TV program: Drawn Together. SBS 9pm Monday nights. Took a while to acquire a taste for it, but its irreverent, filthy and satirical humour rocks!!!

Guns are bad mmmnokay?

…and still the yanks carry on about their right to bear arms. They say it’s always the mental state of the guy holding the gun that kills people, not the gun itself. Reality check: if someone with mad-psycho-killer-tendancies can’t get their hands on weapons, they’re not quite as likely to go on a shooting spree.

america proud of its shocking human rights record

I was watching Lateline last night. The program went to air a couple of hours before David Hicks was to face a military hearing for his alleged terrorist acts.

Some background: A young middle class man from Adelaide was picked up in Afghanistan under dubious circumstances. He has been held in uncle sam’s custody at Guantanamo Bay where he has been subjected to treatment that is in contrvention of the Geneva convention. America has decided the the rules of the Geneva convention which assure POWs a minimum level fair and humane treatment don’t apply in its “war on Terror”. Some of the things that he and other prisoners have been subjected to include sleep deprivation, forced feeding, deliberately controlled extremes of heat and cold, humiliation and sexual abuse. All of this(and worse) has been tabled in American government documents and deemed acceptable methods of extracating “intelligence” from “unlawful combatants”.

Below are some select quotes copied dirctly from the transcript of an interview between the ABC’s Tony Jone and Col. Moe Davis who is the chief prosecutor at Gauntanamo Bay Prison. They illustrate just how rigged the “trial” process is and how well and truly decided the outcome already is. Interestingly, Britain extradited all its citizens who were previously held at the prison years ago.

TONY JONES: Are you aware of any political pressure coming directly or indirectly from the Australian Government to have this situation resolved quickly and for David Hicks to come home quickly?

MOE DAVIS: All that I know about that is what I’ve read in the news media. I can tell you with absolute confidence there’s been no pressure on me whatsoever from the Australian Government or the American Government.

(John Howard has been bleeting on and on about how much pressure he’s been putting on the yanks to see Hicks tried quickly and treated justly…)

TONY JONES: I’d like to ask you this, why is David Hicks shackled to the floor when he meets his lawyers?

MOE DAVIS: That’s standard procedure for any interview. You’ve got to recognise that these are Al Qaeda folks that we’re holding here. You’ve seen around the world the atrocities they’ve committed from Beslan to New York City to Bali. So you’ve got to keep in mind we’re at war. I know folks tend to lose sight of that fact but we’re at war and the enemy, Osama bin Laden, issued a fatwah declaring war, saying everyone is a fair target, men, women, children, civilian, military. So those are the folks that we’re dealing with here.

(Remember he was captured unarmed in Afghanistan by a member of the Northern Alliance who was paid USD1000 for handing him over the americans).

TONY JONES: Let me ask you this. Way back in April of 2003, and Dr Miles just referred to this, the Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld directed that, “Interrogations must always be planned deliberate actions to take into account the detainees’ physical strengths and weaknesses”. Then he went onto say, “Interrogation approaches are designed to manipulate the detainee’s emotions and weakness, to gain his willing cooperation”. Now, was that sort of thing done during David Hicks’ interrogations?

MOE DAVIS: I would certainly hope so. I mean, that’s the purpose of an interrogation is to obtain intelligence information to prevent the next 9/11 or the next Bali bombing. There’s nothing wrong with playing on those factors… (Emphasis mine).

So yep, the guy running the kangaroo court at Gauntanamo Bay is proud of the fact that he’s using techniques in his prson and “trials” that are considered unjust and plain illeagal in all other civilised countries.

Fair enough at the end of the day, Hicks may well have been training with al qaeda, that however doesn’t justify cruel and inhumane treatment while imprisoned by the country that claims to be leading the world in a war to bring freedom and justice to the world.

“Here ends the lesson”