Young drivers ... victims on our roads

Friday's Daily Examiner (Grafton) carried the following piece which was written in 1967 by John Berrio of Rochester, New Hampshire after a friend of his son died in a motor vehicle accident. It later appeared in the advice column Dear Abby.

Please, God, I'm only 17

The day I died was an ordinary school day. How I wish I had taken the bus! But I was too cool for the bus. I remember how I wheedled the car out of Mom. "Special favor," I pleaded. "All the kids drive." When the 2:50 p.m. bell rang, I threw my books in the locker ... free until tomorrow morning! I ran to the parking lot, excited at the thought of driving a car and being my own boss.

It doesn't matter how the accident happened. I was goofing off ‑ going too fast, taking crazy chances. But I was enjoying my freedom and having fun. The last thing I remember was passing an old lady who seemed to be going awfully slow. I heard a crash and felt a terrific jolt. Glass and steel flew everywhere. My whole body seemed to be turning inside out. I heard myself scream.

Suddenly, I awakened. It was very quiet. A police officer was standing over me. I saw a doctor. My body was mangled. I was saturated with blood. Pieces of jagged glass were sticking out all over. Strange that I couldn't feel anything. Hey, don't pull that sheet over my head. I can't be dead. I'm only 17. I've got a date tonight. I'm supposed to have a wonderful life ahead of me. I haven't lived yet. I can't be dead.

Later I was placed in a drawer. My folks came to identify me. Why did they have to see me like this? Why did I have to look at Mom's eyes when she faced the most terrible ordeal of her life? Dad suddenly looked very old. He told the man in charge, "Yes, he's our son."

The funeral was weird. I saw all my relatives and friends walk toward the casket. They looked at me with the saddest eyes I've ever seen. Some of my buddies were crying. A few of the girls touched my hand and sobbed as they walked by.

Please, somebody ‑ wake me up! Get me out of here. I can't bear to see Mom and Dad in such pain. My grandparents are so weak from grief they can barely walk. My brother and sister are like zombies, yhey move like robots. In a daze. Everybody. No one can believe this. I can't believe it, either.Please, don’t bury me! I'm not dead! I have a lot of living to do! I want to laugh and run again. I want to sing and dance. Please‑don't put me in the ground! I promise if you give me just one more chance, God, I'll be the most careful driver in the whole world. All I want is one more chance. Please, God, I'm only 17.

Read more about the piece here

Australian Censor-In-Chief Conroy wimps out?

Conroy is awesome. He's gone from last minute cancellations on #openinternet debates, to actually stopping the OTHER PARTY from debating.
11:09 PM May 12th via web [from Geordie Guy's tweets]

McDonald's Australia spinning it's web around Clarence Valley Council

I don't know which is more disturbing - listening to one Clarence Valley shire councillor attempt to deny that the Yamba community has any right to self-determination or seeing the majority of councillors present fail to question McDonald's Australia when its representative spoke at the Environment, Economic & Community meeting on 11 May 2010.

With traffic a real issue for the community, McDonald's sought to 'massage' the matter away by trying to argue the statistics away.

It asserted words to the effect that the proposed store would never see 230 customers arriving by road in any one hour.

Of course what is did not clarify was that this 230 figure (contained in its own development application documents) represented vehicle movements both to and from this eat-in and drive through fast food outlet during evening peak hour.So in fact the number of individual vehicles would be 115.

McDonald's expects everyone to believe that a store with 112 seat capacity and 2 drive through bays would never see 115 people drive to its store at evening peak hour to pick up a quick dinner or eat one there?In a town which effectively doubles its population during principal tourism periods this would not be possible?

McDonald's start up cost estimates are hefty, so it defies belief that the multinational and its designated licensee would consider laying out that much money on a store they they suspected might under perform.

In Australia an average 1.2 million people reportedly went into a McDonald's store each day in 2007. As McDonald's had 753 stores across the country by that year [McDonald’s Australia Limited National Packaging Covenant Report 2007] this represents an estimated 1,594 customers per store.

With the Australian arm of the corporation continuing to experience increased sales and profits ($364 million profit last financial year) I expect that customer numbers have grown since then. McDonald's does not expect a store in Yamba to measure in its best performing global region?

Pull the other one it has bells on.

Yamba say a big hello to Ronald McDonald!

News of the face-off between that small NSW coastal town Yamba and McDonald's Australia appears to have spread to Illinois.
McDonald's Corporation in Chicago is also turning up on Internet traffic meters Googling yamba mcdonalds for information.

Round the online traps....

Unflattering pic of Tony Abbott alongside ABC News article about his
Budget Reply 13th May 2010

IanLoveridge: Missed the budget reply on purpose. I like my new TV and I didn't want to harm it!
Orcisano: Tony Abbot spent at least 35 minute of his budget reply attacking the government and praising the Howard government.
{Twitter 13th May 2010}

"Accused war criminal "Captain Dragan" Vasiljkovic spent the night in police custody last night in a Coffs Harbour police station after 43 days on the run."
{The Australian 13th May 2010}

"Electronic Frontiers Australia and Australian Privacy Foundation asking the company [Google] to clarify its reasons for collecting personal Wi-Fi network data from Australian homes."
{The Sydney Morning Herald 13th May 2010}

"For Australia's sake, we need to ban the bikini"
{En Passant 11th May 2010}

"Health authorities are warning of the dangers of eating slugs as a Sydney man battles a rare form of meningitis."
{ABC News 13th May 2010}

"Freud signed, but added in his own writing, "I can heartily recommend the Gestapo to anyone."
{Jonathon Glover "Bits and Pieces"}

"THERE is good reason why the North Coast Area Health Service (NCAHS) doesn't want the public to read a report by an emergency medicine expert about the state of the Grafton and Maclean emergency departments (EDs).
Alleged shoddy clinical practices by certain GPs, bullying of nursing staff by senior Visiting Medical Officers (VMOs), bad relations with Coffs Harbour hospital's ED and a culture of overspending on unnecessary pathological tests are just a few of many inflammatory findings of the report."
{The Daily Examiner 7th May 2010}

"Six Things You Need to Know About Facebook Connections"
{Electronic Frontier Foundation 4th May 2010}

Google receives takedown request for multiple Blogspots offering "direct links to files containing soundrecordings for other users to download"
{Internet Anti-Piracy 14th April 2010}

"How Many Bad Assumptions Can You Make In A Single Article About Content Creation And Copyright?"
{Techdirt May 2010}

"A MAN has pleaded guilty over an armed siege at a Port Macquarie McDonald's restaurant last year."
{Port Macquarie News 14th April 2010}

A genetic test will be offered Friday at Walgreens drug stores, but the FDA warns that "consumers are putting themselves at risk if they use a test not approved" by the federal agency. The test, offered by Pathway Genomics, already is offered online. So are similar tests from other companies. The FDA has not previously intervened.
{WebMD 12th May 2010}

"Prominent economist Ross Garnaut says China has shown more leadership in tackling climate change than Australia."

{ABC News 13th May 2010}

Babies!

{Slate 7th May 2010}

Clarence Valley wetland endangered by concrete batching plant

Click on image to enlarge

This wetland at James Creek, just near the Harwood Bridge, is frequented by Black-necked Stork (or Jabiru) and Brolga. The Stork is Endangered and the Brolga is Vulnerable under the Threatened Species Conservation Act (1995). Both are threatened further by a Development Application currently before Clarence Valley Council.

The DA is for a concrete batching plant on land zoned 1(a) Rural (Agricultural protection). The previous plant on the site has been deemed to be ‘operational’ despite not having operated for over twenty years. It would take a couple of QCs considerable time and effort to argue that twenty years of idleness constitutes ‘continuous use’ – but that’s just what they’ve done!

Gary Whale, Yamba

Click on image to enlarge
Photographs courtesy of Helen Roberts

* GuestSpeak is a feature of North Coast Voices allowing Northern Rivers residents to make satirical or serious comment on issues that concern them. Posts of 250-300 words or less can be submitted to ncvguestspeak at live.com.au for consideration.

ICAC finds local government is in temptation's way

Well, who da thunk it? "Local councils are highly vulnerable to corruption".
Academics and assorted experts have been telling us that for years, council watchers have been pointing it out for just as long here in the Northen Rivers.
I mean, when local government elections bring forth councillors with development agendas, higher political office as the end goal, those who quickly forget they were elected not anointed and a state government which never really gives a damn as long as the fraud or political skulduggery doesn't make it into the city papers, what can we expect?
On the make, on the fiddle, on the nose - that's local government's reputation in New South Wales.
No wonder one bloke got up at the McDonald's DA site inspection in Yamba and said he smelled a fix.
He reckons he was told Maccas had the official nod when he was thousands of miles away holidaying in Ol' Blighty. Let's hope he's wrong!
The Independent Commission Against Corruption has just released its April 2010 report which can be found here.

This report found that 77% of the councils studied rated "development applications/rezoning/environmental planning" and 38% rate "failure to disclose/abuse of a conflict of interest" as two of their major corruption risks.

ICAC on reporting corruption

"Corrupt conduct is deliberate or intentional wrongdoing, not negligence or a mistake.

While it can take many forms, corrupt conduct occurs when:

• a public official uses, or tries to use, the knowledge, power or resources of their position for personal gain or the advantage of others
• a public official acts dishonestly or unfairly, or breaches public trust
• a member of the public influences, or tries to influence, a public official to use his or her position in a way that is dishonest, biased or breaches public trust."