As far as I am aware, in the UK and Australia, a tout is someone who buys up tickets for an event, to sell them at inflated prices to people…
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For [Scott] Morrison, words are just distracting noises that come out of a hole in his head. They are not connected to any logic or fact or principle. They are not constrained by anything he has said or done in the past, nor do they commit him to any future course of action. To expect otherwise is to make a categorical error. Morrison’s political career provides no grounds for believing that he will ever give a straight answer to any question, offer a cogent and consistent argument, explain himself in any way, or do anything he says he will do. He has never baulked at any hypocrisy, small or large. He speaks in order to make the very act of questioning him an exercise in futility, addressing no concrete reality beyond the immediate imperative to generate static. It is a form of anti-oratory: the rhetorical equivalent of avoiding an awkward conversation by starting up a leaf blower. [https://sydneyreviewofbooks.com/essay/amen-snorter-rotten-fish/]
Got a phone call last week from a stressed son asking if we could see our way clear to provide some assistance due to severe illness in the family. About…
When Christians talk about how they are being ‘persecuted’ what they really mean is that they are discontent at no longer being able to use social and political power to force their views, their morality or their dogma onto other people the way they once did. They can no longer burn people at the stake, prosecute people for blasphemy, and have much less of an ability to oppress minorities and ‘keep them in their place’. The dogma, ignorance and authoritarianism that is required for Christianity to maintain control has greatly diminished and religious authorities and their institutions no longer have the power nor the respect that they once had. This makes them feel that they are being unfairly persecuted, though they actually have no real understanding of what that word really means.
Now that the date of the election has been called, and the Liberal Party has to actually pay for the election stunts and advertising of Morrison and his nearly invisible…
Murdoch ‘ruperter’ Adam Creighton’s idiocy has been a source of amazement on this blog before, when he thought he was an epidemiologist1,2 and knew better than all epidemiologists how to deal…
When I heard about this candidate, without her name initially being mentioned, I made the assumption that it was the same person I had written about before1. But it wasn’t…
After being shamed into attending the Glasgow COP26 climate conference late last year, rather than sending a minion, Morrison realised he had to have something to take to the conference,…