Columbus go home! Columbus go home!

Last Monday Crooks and Liars posted the transcipt of a tongue-in-check speech given at a Tea Party Against Amnesty And Illegal Immigration rally before an initially cheering crowd of American wingnuts - the best punk'd I've read this year:

Hi, my name is Robert Erickson and I'm really excited to be here. Its people like all of you, and events like this that make our country great! Give yourselves a round of applause!

I just want to talk about a couple themes this afternoon because I love this country and I want to see America be the best place it can be.

Mr. Gutierrez is getting ready to propose an immigration bill in just a few short days, and we have to make sure he knows that we want a bill that's tough on immigration. Now is the time for us to stand up and make our voices heard!

In Minneapolis, where I'm from, we have a huge immigrant population that's been causing a number of problems. With the economy in recession, and so many people getting laid off, and unable to find work, immigrants should not be competing for the few jobs that are out there. It's just not fair to the folks who have a claim to this land and the right to be here. All across America, they are contributing to the flooding of our job markets making it hard for Americans to find jobs. Well, I'm fed up, and it's time to let our politicians know that enough is enough, and we're not gonna take it any more!

We need to secure our borders to protect our country. We need to restore order and put an end to the anarchy that's sweeping the nation. We need tougher immigration laws to make sure that we send these people back where they came from. We need to protect the sovereignty of the real Americans. We need to hold our politicians accountable.

It's no secret that with an invasion of immigrants comes waves of crime. We see them involved in massive theft, in murder, and bringing diseases like smallpox, which is responsible for the death of millions of Americans. These aren't new problems, though -- they have been going on for hundreds of years, and continue to this day.

I say it's time for us to say enough is enough! Are you with me? Are you with me? Let's send these European immigrants back where they came from! I don't care if they are Polish, Irish, English, Italian, or Norwegian! European immigrants are responsible for the most violent and heinous crimes in the history of the world, including genocide and slavery! It's time to restore the sovereignty of people native to this land!

I want more workplace raids, starting with the big banks downtown. There are thousands of illegals working in those buildings, hiding in their offices, and taking Dakota jobs. Let's round them up and ship them out. Then we need to hit them at home where they sleep. I don't care if we separate families, they should have known better when they came here illegally!

If we aren't able to stand up to these European immigrants, who can we stand up to? We need to send every one of them back home, right now.

Thank you very much, and we'll see you in the streets!

Columbus Go Home! Columbus Go Home! Columbus Go Home!

I'll take a serve of national pride, but no whale meat on the side thankyou

Photograph from The Sydney Morning Herald

Japan's new Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama apparently doesn't like whale meat, but according to The Sydney Morning Herald and other sources his desire to protect his country's fishing interests is quite strong:

Despite Hatoyama's reported dislike of whale meat he urged Balkenende to take action against the group over its attacks on Japanese whalers in the Antarctic, government officials said.

There has been some discussion in the media of the possibility that Japan may draw back slightly from a position based mainly on national pride and that the whaling fleet's peak body may be facing funding cuts as reported in The Age:

A Japanese parliamentary review panel targeted the 80 billion yen ($A960 million) given to the OFCF for all of its fisheries programs on Thursday at one of its first public hearings......
A 2008 investigation by the Asahi Shimbun newspaper found that the OFCF had propped up the Institute of Cetacean Research with yearly interest-free loans of around 3.6 billion yen since 2001, but the institute had been unable to pay them back in full.

That Japan might have been considering changing focus from its Antarctica hunt in the southern hemisphere summer to hunts in the North West Pacific and in its own coastal zone is perhaps a faint possibility
as there is a paucity of published JARPA/JARPAII 2008 Antarctic-based research which might in other circumstances indicate a falling away of interest. However this may not denote decline but may be a function of increased intervention by anti-whaling vessels during the whale killing months.

What is a more realistic scenario is that Japan (still convinced that whales are consuming commercial fish stock and causing supply shortages on its domestic market) will continue in the same vein as The Shared Interests of International Whaling Commission Members Supporting the Principle of Sustainable Use Tokyo, Japan 23 April 2009 :

• WE SUPPORT the principle of sustainable use of abundant whale stocks which contribute to sustainable coastal communities, sustainable livelihoods, preservation of cultural traditions, food security and poverty reduction;


• WE OPPOSE placing the use of whales outside the context of the globally accepted concept of sustainable use and the norm of science-based management and rule-making, as whales are no different from any other living marine or terrestrial resource traditionally utilized for food;


• RECOGNIZING that many whale stocks are abundant and increasing, we support the sustainable use of abundant stocks of whales and the protection of depleted ones, consistent with the ICRW;


• WE WELCOME the resumption of international trade in whale products and reiterate that the IWC has no competence on this issue;


• WE NOTE with concern the continued use of existing classifications, such as "Aboriginal Subsistence", "Commercial" and "Small-Type Whaling", as these discriminatory terms have no meaning in resource management.


• WE RECOMMEND strongly the use of the universal language "Harvest Quota" when describing all off-takes of whales irrespective of purpose;


• WE OPPOSE the continuation of the moratorium for those whale stocks that have recovered and are abundant, given the risk-averse management procedure for calculating quotas, that is, the RMP, which has been adopted by consensus by the IWC;


• WE CONTINUE TO REJECT the creation of sanctuaries which are inconsistent with the ICRW;


• WE RECOGNIZE THE NEED of both lethal and non-lethal scientific research related to population growth and the interactions between whales and the marine ecosystem, and


• WE SUPPORT decisions that ensure food security and the maintenance and preservation of traditional food cultures as a fundamental right.

Climate Change: is it all over red rover for the world as we know it?

On the 15th of November 2009 it was confirmed that world leaders at the latest APEC conference had watered down their pre-COP15 statement on climate change goals. The APEC mention of a target figure for lower global greenhouse gas emissions had disappeared up the vested interests' overfed collective posterior about the same time that the draft document prepared for ratification at the Copenhagen meeting had been ripped to shreds.
This followed hot on the heels of a domestic announcement that the Rudd Government was watering down its own national climate change response, with an eviscerated Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme being shaped in negotiation between federal government and what are essentially climate change deniers acting on behalf of big greenhouse gas polluting industries.
It is distressingly apparent that this December the national governments gathered together are not about to bring forth a legally binding global agreement to tackle climate change - even though scientists have been bluntly warning about global warming since the early 1970s and we've literally run out of time to um and ah.
An enforceable global agreement will probably never happen, period.
Instead what the world's populations are being offered is the ephemeral promise of a joint political pledge which can be torn in two at the next round of home-grown elections.
It seems that the largest national economies have reached their own domestic political tipping points and are walking away from the rest of the world with a shrug of the shoulders and a "She'll be right Jack" attitude.
So where does that leave the ordinary Aussie man, woman and child?
It leaves every single one up sh*t creek without a paddle. No realistic options, no escape. Part of an unofficial third world.
Because when things start to go pear-shaped with water, food, electricity, fuels and goods becoming ridiculously expensive due to resource scarcity it will be the ordinary person who will be called upon to bear a disproportionate level of the financial burden and meekly receive a lesser allocation of these resources.
Later, when Australia and the rest of the world moves from scarcity to actual absence of certain vital reserves it will be ordinary people again who will be expected to go hungry, thirsty and place themselves at the mercy local weather extremes.
These same ordinary people will also be expected to pick up their belongings and move away from the coast with little or no help to relocate, for those with money and political pull will be more interested in smoothing their own passage in the face of an ongoing global crisis.
It won't help that you may own your own home - it's likely to be virtually worthless in 30 years time if you live in the immediate coastal zone or perhaps even within seven kilometres of the coast if severe destructive storms are frequent enough.
It won't matter that you were expecting your superannuation fund to see you through retirement - most of the infrastructure and shares it invested in will have gone on the incoming tide, been blown away by endless drought or disappeared into the maw of institutional investor and stock market panic.
No-one will care if you were a good and loyal employee or a lazy worker, a responsible citizen or a couldn't care less grasshopper - by then it's more than possible that your government will be flat broke and unable to offer any form of social safety net.
The politicians and power brokers of today don't really give a damn what happens to you because you're not one of the privileged clique.
It would cost too much in financial and political effort to actually do something effective about the catastrophic climate change bearing inexorably down on us all and these silvertails might actually have to momentarily pause in their obsessive drive for political power and influence or halt for a few financial cycles their current obscene wealth accumulation.
Dragging them out of their beds and lynching them is too good for our so-called world leaders and their multinational backers.
But in Australia the local sub-species of effin' sods obviously feel smugly safe from threat because Aussies don't resort to that sort of mob violence, instead we wait meekly for the pubs and the polls to open.
However, the world will change dramatically over the next fifty years or so and perhaps the then oh so elderly Rudd and Turnbull (flanked by their withered front benchers in bath chairs) shouldn't expect to sleep as peacefully in their retirement beds as their predecessors.

How to get Google's attention

Simply mentioning the name Geoffrey Edelsten is a sure way to have Google notice you.

Today's Sydney Morning Herald features a front page yarn about Edelsten with a pic of his bride-to-be, Brynne Gordon, giving him a pash on the cheek.

The Herald's page 2 has a pic of Edelsten and Gordon at the Brownlow Medal. The less said about that pic, the better.

So, how and why does Google get into the Edelsten picture?

Edelsten, who has a hate-hate relationship with most journos and a track record of going to the Press Council, pays Google to alert him when his name appears. Well, that's what the SMH says today.

Edelsten is behind the website australiasworstjournalist.com.au which appeared this week. The site is registered to Lonnex Pty Ltd (ABN 12097786751).

The sole director of Lonnex is Geoffrey Walter Edelsten but, as the Herald Sun reports, Edelsten denied he had set the site up."I know the person who did set it up, but I haven't seen it myself," he said vaguely. He said he was flying a helicopter and couldn't talk.

Edelsten's PR team produced Edelsten's very flashy website geoffedelsten.com.au

But, why is Edelsten paying Google? Edelsten could save himself a few bucks by setting up some free Google Alerts

Credits: SMH and HS