Ari on the web

It's an even numbered year, it's the Labor Party, it's January... welcome to Hobart!: Friday, 23 January One black mark, however. The Conference dinner was held downriver from Hobart and delegates piled into boats to get there. On arrival, we were ordered to stay on board while Princess Cheryl (Kernot) and her two fawning courtiers, Kim and Gareth, disembarked first. The Labor Royal Family. I hate it when we mimic the hierarchy and snobbery of high society. In Australia, socialism has always been a social habit, much more than a political program. We are all equal in our mateship group. Now, unhappily in the ALP at least, some are more equal than others. - Page 71 This idea is almost as scary as Mark Latham, PM: Tuesday, 24 March An interesting conversation with Leo McLeay, who reckons that Martin Ferguson will be the next Labor MP: 'Kim will lose twice and then Ferguson will take over - he's got the working-class credentials and the support of the unions, j...

Interesting. A blog for those of us in the call centre industry. Waiting On Hold.

A decent joke has landed in my inbox, a thankfully it's marginally better than the 'insert hated politician's name here' jokes: President Bush and Don Rumsfeld are sitting in a bar. A guy walks in and asks the barman, “Isn’t that Bush and Rumsfeld sitting over there?” The barman says, “Yep, that’s them.” So the guy walks over and says, “Wow, this is a real honor! What are you guys doing in here?” Bush says, “We’re planning WW III.” And the guy says, “Really? What’s going to happen?” Bush says, “Well, this time we’re going to kill 140 million Muslims and one blonde with big tits.” The guy exclaimed, “A blonde with big tits? Why kill a blonde with big tits?” Bush turns to Rumsfeld and says, “See, I told you no one would care about the 140 million Muslims”. Not bad.

Gee, that's unusual for Ross Cameron: Friday, 14 February Ross Cameron, the brilliant but creepy Liberal Member for Parramatta, has talked me into participating in his youth leadership forum in Canberra. I rather suspect it's a front for mobilising young Christian soldiers, plus some quality box for Ross. Thank goodness I wasn't the only one sucked in. Howard and Beazley addressed the opening session yesterday and gave some interesting insights into their background. - Page 57 And Howard the stinker: Friday, 14 March A great day's cricket, playing for the Parliamentary XI against the Crusaders at Albert Mark in Melbourne. Our side was reinforced by (former Australian fast bowler) Merv Hughes and the middle-order batting wizardry of John Howard. Actually, he's hopeless. A real rabbit with the bat and The Man From Unco with the ball, the sort of player who was an automatic selection as scorer in schoolboy teams. I walked away from the ground thinking, there go...

Was Gareth really a no-hoper in his short time as Shadow Treasurer? Latham reckons he was: Thursday, 18 April Earlier today, the mighty Gareth told me that 'I want to go back to Foreign Affairs'. He's trying to rote-learn the economy and it's not working. He knows nothing about National Competition Policy and Hilmer. It's really quire scary, shattering the image I had of super-competent Hawke and Keating ministers. The more I see of the frontbench, the more sceptical I become. - Page 47 The first Howard/Costello budget was delivered in August, and for those who remember it was a grusome slash and burn budget as the incoming administration sought to turn around the massive deficit of Keating/Beazley/Willis (everyone remember the "$8 billion Beazley black-hole", a phrase in the rhetorical spirit of the Beazley flip-flop?). Anyhow, with health, education and just about every other government service having the guts ripped out of it, here's how Lath...

Kerry and Mark? Nope, it's John and Bryan : INTERVIEWER: Gee, you've cut quite a swathe this week. MARK LATHAM: I don't know about a swathe, Bryan, but I certainly cut a bit of a swathe during the week. INTERVIEWER: It's a tough business, isn't it, politics? MARK LATHAM: I don't know about tough, Bryan, but I'll tell you something about this business, it's pretty tough. INTERVIEWER: Didn't you know it was going to be tough when you went into it, though? MARK LATHAM: Yeah, yeah. You don't go into a business like this, Bryan, without knowing it's going to be tough. I knew it would be tough. I knew it would be tough. I knew it would be tough. INTERVIEWER: Did anything surprise you about it, though? MARK LATHAM: Only the toughness, Bryan, only the toughness. INTERVIEWER: But you would have expected that, wouldn't you? MARK LATHAM: I did.

For those American Northkoreaphiles comes this interesting snippet of news, courtesy of NKzone : NK Opens to US tourists (briefly!) Travel by Simon Cockerell I've just heard from Pyongyang that US passport holders will be welcomed to North Korea as tourists until the end of the Arirang Mass Games festival; recently extended to run until October 17th. Koryo Tours of course and probably others will be running trips to the event for US citizens, during that time. If you've got $2000 and a week spare, treat yourself to a mindblowing experience.