Airbus A380

We are being governed by a bunch of mad men! On the Religion and Ethics Report on Radio National this morning, that idiot Attorney General Brandis is criticising the ABC and Fairfax papers as being “anti religion”. Being biased against religious matters, and especially the Catholic Church.

Anyone see the irony? It’s being reported on the ABC, on the only religion program on Australian radio. Other news outlets may not criticise religion, but they don’t even talk about it. Their silence means they just don’t care, not interested, couldn’t give a stuff.

I don’t see the Fairfax papers often enough to know, so I’ll have to stay quiet on that, but why would a news organisation wage a campaign against a particular religion? The Catholic church is not exactly squeaky clean. It’s riddled with pedophiles and the hierarchy has covered it all up. This is a crime! It must be reported on. Hundreds of children and adults have been terribly damaged for life by the Catholic church. This is news. And reporting critical news can hardly be called a campaign.

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As for the Rabbott’s Paid Parental Leave monster, uncosted, unfunded, no-one who knows government schemes has a good word to say about it.

And once again, the Conservative politicians are committing us to military action without being asked by the major players and without parliamentary debate. Sure, they say they’ll debate, but they’ve already announced what were going to do.

By the way, they’re saying we’ll send all our F/A18 Super Hornets and operate them off US aircraft carriers. But our F/A18s were never fitted out for carrier operation. That requires beefed up landing gear and a tail hook at minimum. Huh?

This is yet another in the line of Liberal governments committing us to war without consultation of the people. Viet Nam and the giant lies told by Menzies and Holt. Iraq in 2003 – Howard never consulted, he just went ahead and announced “All the way with my friend George”. And he gets called Man of Steel ! You could see him preening.

Grrrr!

PS: They’re saying they’ll send ALL our F/A18s off to the Arabian Gulf. But the rationale for buying and operating these hugely expensive planes was always to defend the continent of Australia.

So if we send them all away, how are we going to ward off all the Yellow Peril hordes who will immediately see we’re defenceless and attack us?  What a joke.

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Speaking of steel, another book arrived yesterday. It’s the Japan book, and what makes it special is the metallic steel grey binding. with matching slip case. It looks great. I think there’s another copy to come, I usually order two.

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The madness of Perth drivers. Everyone has to pass me, even though I’m doing spot on 80Km/h by my speedo. So a car races past me and comes up against the car in front of it, whereon it has to brake. So it sits no more than 5m behind it, surging forward, braking, surging, braking, about every 20 secs.

I have a GPS and I know my indicated 80Km/h is actually about 77Km/h. That’s not unusual and should be the same for every car. So everyone exceeds the speed limit, even on 80Km/h roads. Losers.

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I’ve done a spreadsheet on the cruise/holiday and all up, including airfares and hotels for five weeks, it’ll be about $4,000 each. This includes the 12 night, 7 port cruise, 4 nights Beijing, 4 nights Hanoi, 5 nights Bangkok and 6 nights Bali on the way home. This is good. Five weeks all up. And I don’t actually have to return from Bali if I don’t want to. My friend has to come back for work (he’s 67 but won’t retire), but with no dog to worry about and an automatic watering system, I can stay away as long as I like. Hmmm.

But boy, I had to do a fair bit of walking today and I’m not in good shape. I battle as I go. I have to push on through the pain of back and leg muscles. (I’m not breathless though.) I just get so weary after 5 mins or so. This is hard.

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Speaking of which, there’s a new book out called Sell Up, Pack Up and Go. I’ve ordered it. It’s written by Colleen Ryan, the eminent Fairfax journalist and her husband, about just selling your assets here, discarding everything unneeded and going overseas to rent to live. Just stay as long as you want to in one place and when you get the urge, move on to another place, another country. Rent, don’t buy (I’m talking about after retirement, of course.)

It’s attractive to me, but in the next thought, I’m thinking about needing a new chest of drawers and my dream of a model railway. Medical matters are also a very big factor too.

I’ve realised that I’m now in a position to offer a house swap too. It wasn’t feasible in the Trigg house, but it’s very feasible here. I could put all my stuff in one of the spare bedrooms and lock it up. It would force me to de-clutter and properly furnish and organise the rest of house, too. I’ve never really overcome my mess since I’ve been here. Some boxes and items remain where they fell in April last year! I need more cabinets and book shelves, but I’m very reluctant to buy more furniture.

Just a thought.