willedoo

I know the feeling. Arthritis in the knees means normal knee propulsion to get up off the ground is long gone. I end up like a beetle on my back, then have to roll over on all fours and get up that way.

I was going through some files and came across this photo from when I was converting my shed from 36 sq.m to 85 sq.m.. Checked the exif data and it was taken eighteen years ago. How times change. What really stands out is how decrepit the body is now and how I'd have no hope of building that these days. I can barely lift my old jackhammer, let alone use it.

Adapting Gerry Rafferty's lyrics to Australian politics: "Clowns to the left of us, Jokers to the right, here we are, stuck in the middle with Albo".

It will be interesting to see what becomes of a high court challenge. The judge in this case said it functioned as a test case for the claims of both parties. Marty, you judge Hanson's intent on her past history and you have every reason to, but a court can't take any previous statements on other past matters into account; they must only judge on the matter at hand. If an appeal to the high court happens, they'll have to judge on whether her words I quoted in a previous post constitute racism. The words alone don't in my opinion. Pakistan is a geographic area and a soverign state, so on words alone she's telling someone to go back there. It's her intent in using those words that the courts decide on. On words alone it's no different than if you came up here and I told you to piss off back to Tasmania. You know yourself how many times Tasmanians have said they wish mainlanders would piss off back to the mainland. That's not racist, and it could be argued not necessarily Stateist, just a desire to be left alone. But on words alone, it's no different to what Hanson said.

Sorry to requote Marty but she didn't tweet that. This is the text in question: “Your attitude appalls and disgusts me. When you immigrated to Australia you took every advantage of this country. You took citizenship, bought multiple homes, and a job in a parliament. It’s clear you’re not happy, so pack your bags and piss off back to Pakistan - PH.” Probably where you've got that from is that Justice Angus Stewart found Hanson’s comment that Faruqi should “piss off back to Pakistan” was a “variant of the slogan ‘go back to from where you came from’” which he said was an a “racist trope” and a “strong form of racism”. So she didn't say it but the Judge had the opinion that it meant the same as another saying they considered racist.

No I'm not saying that Marty. Read my post more carefully. What I'm saying is that the words alone don't refer to race, only former nationality. Get over the Hanson thing for a minute and think about the words alone, no matter who utters them. She told the person to piss off back to the country she migrated from, no mention of the person's race or religion. Forget about Hanson and look at the example of a white Australian telling a white Kiwi to piss off back to NZ. Would those words alone constitute racism of one white person toward another? I'd consider a case like that to be nationalistic based and not race based. If Hanson had told a white South African to piss off back to South Africa, is that racist? Would she be having a go at the person's race or nationality? The point I'm making is, that the words she used are not racist but nationalistic. That's looking solely at the wording and not taking perceived intent into account. The court obviously made the decision that they thought she had racist intent in what she said. The words alone (regardless of who spoke them) don't convey that. That's what a high court challenge will have to sort out.

Trike seen in Brisbane last week.

Section 8(1) of the RDA makes it lawful.

In the foreseeable future, it's only the moon they have to worry about. It will be a long time before they have the technology to shoot rockets at the Emu.

Purtting the intent aside, are those particular words racist? Just on the wording alone, I'd call them nationalistic as only the country was mentioned, not the person's race or religion. As an example, if an anglo saxon descent Australian person told a Pom of anglo saxon descent to piss off back to England, is that rascist even tough both parties are of the same race. Intent can differ, but the wording is the same in both cases. I always thought rascism was bias against someone because of their race, not nationality. If you are white and told two South Africans to piss off back to South Africa and one is black and one is white, is it racism in both cases, only in one case or in none?

Jerry, I'm not sure how my credit card security works these days. The card was originally branded in my bank's name but was administered by Citibank. They were good; if there was any unusual transactions they would put a hold on it and make contact. My bank eventually gave up on credit cards and it somehow migrated to one run by NAB, which is not my bank. I don't know how good the security is with the new entity. My bank doesn't do much anymore. The only loans they deal in are housing and business loans, no credit cards, most of the physical branches shut down, third world country outsourced customer support.

At least I've got plenty of company; about 900,000 customers were involved.

My energy retailer Origin has just sent me an update on the recent data hack of their customer information. They confirmed my details were part of it, including name and address, phone number, date of birth, BSB number and last three digits of my bank account, last four digits of the credit card number and customer account details. It's just the nail in the coffin; I was leaving them anyway before this happened due to their sub standard customer support.

On the positive side, he's only got to hang in another 2,999 days before he gets a statue.

Almost Jerry. You got the u and the i arse about - Crisafulli.