Political gunge
Oct. 29th, 2004 05:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dreamer_easyAustralia:
We pretty much have a Senate result. The Coalition (between the conservative Liberal and National parties) have a majority of 39 seats, meaning they can pass their own legislation unamended and can quash Senate inquiries into their doings. Labor has 28 Senators, the Dems and Greens each have 4, and Family First have 1.
Democrazy: ten ideas for change. The draft final chapter of Margo Kingston's book Not Happy, John.
Speaking of John Howard: Iraq war spurs local terrorists, says ASIO. Thanks a bundle, mate.
US:
Wickedness from The Onion: Republicans Urge Minorities to get Out and Vote on Nov. 3
UK:
Australian novelist Sophie Masson has a fit of the filthy quislings over the Church of Satan guy in the British Navy, worried that spoooooky things will happen. This is amusing up to a point: drawing a connection between Polanski directing Rosemary's Baby and the vicious murder of Sharon Tate is, frankly, offensive. The Guardian's Catherine Bennett takes a more fruitful path by taking the piss, but sadly also comes down firmly on the side of religious bigotry, perhaps without noticing that at least some of the stuff she finds hilarious about Satanist rituals, such as the extensive equipment, can also be levelled at mainstream religions. (Certainly Wiccans would be "excluded from public life" and left unprotected against religious vilification if Bennett's standards were applied.)
ETA: A letter in the Herald quips that the sailor need not choose between the devil and the deep blue sea.
And just generally:
How Yehudi Menuhin got his name.
We've gotta lock this guy in a room with Comptroller Schaefer.
We pretty much have a Senate result. The Coalition (between the conservative Liberal and National parties) have a majority of 39 seats, meaning they can pass their own legislation unamended and can quash Senate inquiries into their doings. Labor has 28 Senators, the Dems and Greens each have 4, and Family First have 1.
Democrazy: ten ideas for change. The draft final chapter of Margo Kingston's book Not Happy, John.
Speaking of John Howard: Iraq war spurs local terrorists, says ASIO. Thanks a bundle, mate.
US:
Wickedness from The Onion: Republicans Urge Minorities to get Out and Vote on Nov. 3
UK:
Australian novelist Sophie Masson has a fit of the filthy quislings over the Church of Satan guy in the British Navy, worried that spoooooky things will happen. This is amusing up to a point: drawing a connection between Polanski directing Rosemary's Baby and the vicious murder of Sharon Tate is, frankly, offensive. The Guardian's Catherine Bennett takes a more fruitful path by taking the piss, but sadly also comes down firmly on the side of religious bigotry, perhaps without noticing that at least some of the stuff she finds hilarious about Satanist rituals, such as the extensive equipment, can also be levelled at mainstream religions. (Certainly Wiccans would be "excluded from public life" and left unprotected against religious vilification if Bennett's standards were applied.)
ETA: A letter in the Herald quips that the sailor need not choose between the devil and the deep blue sea.
And just generally:
How Yehudi Menuhin got his name.
We've gotta lock this guy in a room with Comptroller Schaefer.
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no subject
Date: 2004-10-28 08:49 pm (UTC)This was very much a case of bad vs. worse. At least this way when the lib-nats f@ck everyone up the @rse over the next few years, it will be all their own doing and not blamed on the workings of Family First.
Not that the policies wouldn't have been the same anyway. It is the blame that would have been different.
I am not saying that FF would rubber stamp everything. I am saying that the lib-nats are currently as much a bunch of right wing nutjobs as family first (unlike the liberals under, say, Fraser), and the two parties current policies are likely to co-incide in so many areas as to make the FF impact minimal. But at least this way the Lib-Nats can't put in a psycho christian fascist policy and then say Family first made them do it. They at least will wear the blame themselves.
This is why pauline was so good for australian politics: she devided the right wing. FF absorbs christians, and thus has the risk of unifying the right. I am much more scared of FF than I ever was of O.N. Religion and Politics *shiver*. Did you read that rather excellent New Yorder artictle about W's certainty and faith... very engaging reading.
Evan
no subject
Date: 2004-10-28 08:56 pm (UTC)Band name rights, mind. (Their album: Electric Kool-Aid Funky Satan Groove.)
that rather excellent New Yorder artictle
Ooh! Got a link?
no subject
Date: 2004-10-28 09:15 pm (UTC)and YORKER (spell check spell check)... turns out it was the NY Times: linky