“SORRY, SORRY, SORRY (SINCERE REGRETS)”

Now we’re a country with a heart of gold,
Or at least that’s what we’re taught and told,
The kinda place that’s the envy of the world.

 But there’s some things that ain’t too thrillin’
Like “The X Factor” or seam gas drillin’,
That when I hear about, do make my toes fair curl.

We’re very sorry for Pauline Hanson,
She can’t wash a car and she’s shit at dancin’,
She ain’t much superior to anyone.

Sorry for whinin’ and fallin’ to our knees-
Whoops! Here’s a boat from Indonese!
Run for the hills and don’t forget the guns!

(CHORUS)
Sorry, sorry, sorry, sincere regrets,
Sorry for all the things we’ve done, and the things we ain’t done yet.
We’re so sorry it makes us cry,
Sorry that our planes don’t fuckin’ fly,
Sorry for the floods and the levy and the flies and the sharks and the pests.

Alan Jones is sorry for his choice of language,
I wish he were the meat in a gay leper sandwich,
Alan Joyce is sorry he’s brung The Troubles.

We’re sorry ‘bout the price of bananas,
And Coles and Woolies fuckin’ over the farmers,
But I still shop there, ‘cause the other places cost me double! (Sorry)

We’re sorry about Andrew Bolt’s pity,
The sook could be heard from city to city,
But old Andy, he ain’t sorry ‘bout much at all.

“My freedom of speech is under threat!”,
And, “Ordinary folk can’t place a bet!”,
“These Muslims and ni**ers gonna rape and kill us all!”

(CHORUS)
Sorry, sorry, sorry, sincere regrets,
Sorry for all the things we’ve done, and the things we ain’t done yet.
We’re so sorry it makes us cry,
Sorry that our planes don’t fuckin’ fly,
Sorry for the floods and the levy and the flies and the sharks and the pests.

We’re sorry for climate change,
No doubt these scientists are all insane!
You can predict the climate from the entrails of a chicken!

And we’re sorry for Katter and Barnaby Joyce,
Add Angry Anderson and you’re spoilt for choice
For candidates with the brainpower of a kitten!

And we’re bloody sorry for Julia Gillard,
And for Kevin Rudd, whom she doth spill’ed,
Poor dear went off his Iced Vo-Vo’s for a month.

But we’re mortified by Tony Abbott,
In his budgie smugglers with his budgie’s scabbard,
I’m sorry, but I’m about to lose my lunch!

(CHORUS)
Sorry, sorry, sorry, sincere regrets,
Sorry for all the things we’ve done, and the things we ain’t done yet.
We’re so sorry it makes us cry,
Sorry that our planes don’t fuckin’ fly,
Sorry for the floods and the levy and the flies and the sharks and the pests.

We of the Australian pharmaceutical industry and its related interests and concerns are alarmed at the Federal government’s recently announced policy intentions seeking to introduce mandatory dosage recommendations on prescription and non-prescription medicines and medicinal products.

It is our firm belief that introducing such restrictions on products that are legally and freely available to any Australian within current age regulations will seriously impact on the ability of the Australian pharmaceutical industry and its related interests and concerns to continue operating on the level of profitability necessary to viably invest in much-needed further research into the medical, scientific and pharmaceutical fields that are vital to the continuing health, well-being and welfare of not only all Australians, but people throughout the world.

Our independently conducted research has concluded that the introduction of such mandatory dosage restrictions and recommendations may potentially cost the industry upwards of $13 billion in lost research and development investments per annum, which carries with it dire implications for the average Australian citizen’s health and their ability to treat their health issues and concerns responsibly and independently of government interference. By restricting such current freedoms, the government also fails to grasp the enormous cost and pressure such a policy of restrictions will place upon the national health care system as more and more people, unable to responsibly self-medicate will, potentially, consume the time and attentions of health professionals on relatively trivial matters that would be best served on those far more serious.

The Federal government’s current policy intentions signify not only an interference in an individual’s right to choose their own treatment regime as their needs may dictate, but a breach of confidentiality between the recommendations of health professionals and their patients. Therefore, it is our most sincere intention to continue to aggressively protest the introduction of such a policy by the current government as we believe it represents not only a highly unfair and discriminatory imposition on our industry and its related interests and concerns, but a violation of every Australian citizen’s right to live and make decisions about the course of their lives unhindered by government intervention and restrictions.

It is down paths such as these that the seeds of totalitarianism are sown.

Sincerely,
The Australian Pharmaceutical Industry and its Related Interests and Concerns

For the uninitiated the Occupy protests are a spin off of the Occupy Wall Street protest that has been happening in New York for about a month now and in this past weekend several local Occupy protests have been started in Australian cities. Occupy Sydney and Melbourne seem to be the biggest and most organised, but these also seem to be more tightly controlled by the various socialist groups that regularly attend most left of centre protests. Quickly these protests morphed into the same Free Palestine/Capitalism is bad/Boycott Max Brenner of most far left protests of recent months.

Occupy Brisbane on the other hand had more of a touch of unpredictability about it, it seemed to be less professionally organised and acted as a magnet for various unrelated people who were angry at “the government” and “the man”. The real fun started when twitter found the live feed yesterday afternoon and the spontaneous hilarity it provided. As no-one recorded the feed I will attempt to try and explain some of the lulz, but it may very well be one of those “you had to be there” things that is lost on anyone who didnt originally see it. But anyway, here is a breif summary of some of the funniest bits of Occupy Brisbane.

Photo via @JamesCroft

Big pharmaceutical companies are suppressing cures for cancer.

Reserve bank, is part of the 1% and holding down the 99%

A colourful character referred to on twitter as “ute-guy” told a story of buying a nice ute via GE Money credit. When he failed to keep up with his repayments he was horrified when GE Money repossessed his ute. Presumably he was attending Occupy Brisbane to fight for a world where he doesnt have to pay for utes, or something.

Various anti-vaccinations, chemtrails and this being Queensland anti-fluoride in the water cranks giving their screed over the feed.

And then the real star of the show turned up, 18 year old Tayne or “DC Hat Guy” to his fans because of his Fred Durst style backwards skater hat. Some of the insightful gold from DC Hat Guy.

“The vibes are so good here that I havent smoked drugs for three days”

“People are not sleeping in Africa”

“We went to like round up some homeless people to give them food, it was rad”

“I don’t think this is a political thing, it’s an equality thing, i just want people to be happy. If people were happy that would be sick!”

DC Hat Guy quickly became very popular on twitter and before long he had his own parody twitter account and t-shirt.

But just like most revolutions it wasnt long until the revolution would be betrayed. For all the talk of freedom and direct democracy slowly and slowly the big wigs of occupy Brisbane got more and more reluctant to answer questions and engage in discussions with the live webstream. More and more often the moderators of this supposedly leaderless group would ban commenters from the stream and shut down debate entirely. It was the “some animals are more equal than others” moment for Occupy Brisbane. All the youthful idealism of an ideal world of three days ago was lost as the faceless men of the movement sought to control the flow of information from the movement. They even informed the webstream that the General Assembly would NOT be livestreamed. The move from open democracy to backroom dictatorship controlled by faceless men was around 72 hours.

But there was one idealist who stayed true to the belief of the revolution and it was the one and only DC Hat Guy. Over the livestream we saw DC Hat Guy stay true to the principles of the revolution to the autocrats in the movement. When they had an argument about freedom of speech in the movement and over the webstream the autocrats supported more banning and controlling of debate but DC Hat Guy gave an impassioned plea to stay true to their principles declaring

“They can troll the crap out of me, I don’t give a shit. Trolls are people too”

Threatened by DC Hat Guys popularity with the public as the unofficial face of the revolution the autocrats had a talk about keeping strict control over the webfeed. It could be the last we see of DC hat Guy as the faceless autocrats seek to make him an unPerson. So to the Leon Trotsky of this revolution, DC Hat Guy, we support you. They may silence you but they wont silence your message. For FREEDOM!

“If people were happy that would be sick”

via @ErikVeland

Update: Some other posts about Occupy Brisbane here and here

Lots of people on twitter mentioning bits that I didn’t see, unfortunately I only saw a small part of last night so feel free to add your own highlights in the comments section.

He appears every weekday on the radio.

He has his own TV show.

I don’t think his speech is really that threatened, do you?

The take away from today will be a discussion about “free speech”. There will inevitibly be those who wil argue that speech should be completely free and unrestricted. These libertarian types will no doubt get their knickers in a knot over it all. They will use the word “freedom” like the smurfs use “smurf”. And then there will be those who are quietly (or perhaps less quietly) glad that Bolt is finally getting his comeuppance. I have to admit that it’s like watching a murdering drug kingpin go down for tax evasion; it’s not how I’d like it to happen but part of me enjoys it all the same.

I love the idea of free speech, don’t you. I haven’t heard anyone argue otherwise. I think this debate centres more around degrees of free speech than any level of opposition to it. But like everything I think it gets pretty murky when you start looking at the details.

I think free speech would work great if everyone’s speech was equal, but it isn’t, is it? My speech is not equal to the speech of Andrew Bolt or his media asset owning overlords. Chances are, yours isn’t either.

So if a powerful media organization decided that it would like to say something about you (perhaps it is to do with your race, your performance at work, or you personal opinions outside of work) what chance does your speech have against that? Can you yell as loud as News Ltd?

Maybe these “restrictions” on free speech aren’t such a bad thing if it protects those that don’t have as much free speech as others. Maybe ensuring that those with more forceful free speech treat it with the respect and responsibility that it deserves is a good thing, even if it occasionally gets into murky water around issues of “freedom”.

Of course, when the legal system is used to shut down blogs *cough* and trample on those with soft voices the system is probably not working.

I don’t have any answers, but I think framing the discussion as “for freedom” and “against freedom” doesn’t help anyone. I think today was about “being a dickhead about it” vs “rationally discussing issues”, I think the court came down on the side of “don’t be a c***”.

But I will leave the last word to well known advocate of unity, Andrew Bolt:

“I argued then and I argue now that we should not insist on the differences between us but focus instead on what unites us as human beings. Thank you.”

That’s about all I have to say this morning. Carry on being free.

UPDATE: Dave over at Pure Poison has a copy of the law and the judgment on the blog. The issue doesn’t seem to be expressing his opinion. It seems like it was about the lies and distortions and stuff.

Latest of the celebrities who are supposedly concerned about the use of animals in fashion is local MTV host Ruby Rose. Ruby is posing naked in this month’s Maxim magazine to promote the cause of PETA and specifically against the use of fur in fashion. But just how sincere is Ruby to the animal rights cause? Well she may be passionately anti-fur since at least last Tuesday yet when she created her own fashion line last year they included…. leather.

 

The casual range includes distressed jeans, leather jackets, denim skirts and slouchy T-shirts, with an emphasis on digital prints.

Perhaps she’s only interested in saving the cute animals.

Lordy, lordy, won’t you help me please, for I was about 41 or 42 when this conversation about refugees became the Australia’s Cup of political footballs, and I am almost 53 today, and this conversation continues, and it surely does exhaust my tired ol’ mind sumfin’ awful and wearies my chalky ol’ bones to the marrow, yes’m, indeed it do, amen to that and praise this day.

For I have worn out my last pair of rubber underpants and peed my last panicked puddle of despair over the dire straits of it all, I can pee and squeal no more, I’m plum all peed and squealed out, looks like they’re here and they’re here to stay and they’re coming, more of them, every day, thousands upon thousands upon thousands of whacked-out dingbats in bomb-laden dinghies to blow us all to that great brick shithouse in the sky, fuck our sheep and fill our pies with felafel.

By God in the almighty heavens above our tender heads, it is a sad truth today that the fabric of our society is indeed a torn and ragged rag of a thing now.

Yes, Sweet Jesus, it is but a pair of ol’, piss-streaked y-fronts on the spindly and spotted frame of an 80 year old digger with its arse all hangin’ out to buggery, and the people of this fair land ain’t havin’ none of it no mo’, they’s a souffle of social unrest a-risin’ in the heartland, all angry cheese and righteous dustings of outraged flour over the changing state of this nation and these seemingly endless series of vile upheavals that have seen our shores swarm with murderin’ beards and their murderin’ ways, smokin’ hookahs and bakin’ flatbreads and those little jelly sweets that are dusted with sugary shit, I quite like those and I don’t really have much of a sweet tooth.

…

…

Sorry, where was I?

Oh.

Yes …

5.30 on Channel 9′s “Today” show this morning opens with the headline story, “They’re here! More boats headed for our shores carrying potentially hundreds of asylum seekers and they could be here as soon as today!”, it’s Groundhog Day, I punch the mute button on the remote and wait for it to go away.

Lordy, lordy, won’t you help me please, for I was about 41 or 42 when this conversation about refugees became the Australia’s Cup of political footballs, and I am almost 53 today, and this conversation continues, and it surely does exhaust my tired ol’ mind sumfin’ awful and wearies my chalky ol’ bones to the marrow, yes’m, indeed it do, amen to that and praise this day …

The justification for his actions, or so he would present them, are largely cultural and political and ideological, and he would like us to realise, he insists that we realise, that his actions have some underlying meaning, that we must understand what he is telling us, and that his actions, drastic as they may have been, were the only way, or one way at least, to compel us to listen.

Yes.

Yes, of course, I will stop what I am doing, I shall cease believing in what I believe, I shall discard my political and ideological and sociological convictions, all of which lean distinctively to the “left”, and I will do so simply because you have demanded that my attention, and the attention of the world, be paid you, and you will squeal like a child if it is not.

Or, perhaps, you will blow us all up.

No one wants to be blown up.

Therefore, I guess, you win.

No.

It really isn’t that easy.

It is curious that commentators are now commenting upon this individual and his actions as if they represent a thing, a movement, beliefs, a system of some sort, and that this thing is a bigger thing than it is, and indicative of some wider malaise threatening to riot throughout the modern world, and that the thing itself is to blame, the individuals merely misguided messengers, and so it must mean this, and so it must mean that, and so it must mean something other than what it is, for it cannot be simply what it is, for what it is is far too banal an excuse or reason for such outrageous carnage.

Listen … A serial killer is not a hyper-intelligent mastermind of infinitely novel and murderous invention, as innumerable Hollywood cinematic fantasias would represent to us.

A serial killer needs to cut someone’s throat because it’s the only way they can get their dicks hard, that’s all.

There’s not much more to it than that, really.

And a “spree” killer, such as the individual who is currently haunting the headlines throughout the known world, is just another dickhead with a gun.

This dickhead, like every other dickhead with a gun before him, and like every other dickhead with a gun that comes after him, has wrapped his emotional infantilism, his intellectual inadequacies and immaturity in a flag he thinks is a clubhouse, given his “clubhouse of one” a stupid name, and gone shootin’ to teach the world a lesson.

Because.

Because we weren’t paying him the attention he felt he deserved.

Because we weren’t reading what he wrote.

Because when he spoke, we all moved to the next table.

Because those girls didn’t want to fuck him, they thought he was creepy.

Because no one ever asked him out for coffee.

Because no one gave a fuck about his weekend.

Because he couldn’t get a “friend” on Facebook.

Because and because and because.

And so on.

But.

This dickhead, like every other dickhead with a gun before him, and like every other dickhead with a gun that comes after him, represents NO wide political ideology, no religion, no creed, no colour or culture.

Hell, this dickhead doesn’t even represent the multitudes of other dickheads out there, most of whom can safely be let alone to sit in a puddle of their own urine somewhere, picking insects from their pubic hair and shouting conspiracies at the radio.

No, this dickhead was just another dickhead who thought it was all about him, and that it should be all about him, but nobody agreed with dickhead, so dickhead got mighty pissed about that and got himself a gun and went shootin’.

Like dickheads so often do.

And that’s all he’ll ever be.

Just another dickhead with a shotgun.

This revolting development has occurred because “home prices eased a further 0.3% in April, 1.2% over the April quarter, and 1.5% over the past year, seasonally adjusted”, whatever the fuck that means.

And I am moved to wonder.

In the small, bog-ordinary, late ‘80’s style (which means no style whatsoever) block of six flats I currently live in (renting), the flat across the hall from mine sold last year for half a million bucks.

If it were to go on the market now, I presume that this “easement” of home prices at 0.3% would mean that it would sell for a whopping $1500.00 less.

From $500,000.00 to $498,500.00.

My heart bleeds for the vendor.

It’s a 2 bedroom flat.

It’s the same size and layout as mine, 2 bathrooms, one of which is an ensuite, the other doubles as a laundry. It’s kitchen is a kitchenette, which means more than one person at a time, there’s a crowd. From the balcony, you get a view of the block of flats across the street and if you turn your head to the right you get a view of the block of flats next door. Turn your head to the left, and you’ll see me on the balcony smoking a cigarette and scowling at you.

On a clear day, if you turned your head to the right, you might get a view of someone in the block next door shaving their armpits in the shower, because you can see straight through their bathroom window.

I wonder if that counts as “water glimpses”?

For real water glimpses however, wander about four blocks down and have a gander at the storm water channel on steroids known as the Brisbane River.

On the way back, stop in at the local pub, a big barn of a place that’s been renovated in such a fashion that all traces of style, history and character have been eradicated from it, a style I refer to as “airport toilette”. You can pay five and a half bucks for a schooner of basic beer, and thirty bucks for a 250g steak and a small fistful of salad while you’re there.

After which, you can take a relaxed stroll through the delightfully eclectic, village-like atmosphere of the shopping centre medium-sized, arse-ugly concrete shopping mall, grab a five buck bottle of cleanskin chardonnay from Liquorland, go home, get drunk and then put a bullet in your head because you’ve just realised that forking out a half million bucks for a bloody flat makes you a fucking moron.

In 1983, when I was 24 and earning about 23 or 24 grand a year as a royalty clerk for a record company, I rented a one bedroom flat in Kirribilli for 68 bucks a week. It was a nice, tidy, older style place, close to everything, no views to speak of, but you only had to go outside the block and look down the street for those, and when the owner told me he had decided to sell up a couple years later, I asked what he thought he might get for the place.

He replied, “Oh, about 65 or 70 thousand, they tell me”.

I was only young and single and had no desire to hook myself into a home loan for several decades, but I could easily grasp the amount as a realistic one and potentially achievable in terms of what I was then earning, certainly a lot of money at the time to fork out, but not an impossible ask.

About 4 years worth of my then annual gross salary, compared to about 12 times now for the 2 bed ratbox across the hall.

I recently spied a “studio apartment” for sale in Kirribilli for 270 thousand.

A studio apartment is real estate speak for “bedsitting room”. Typically, they’re about the size of a linen cupboard and the kitchen comprises a portable two-plate gas-burner and a bucket hung off a tap for a sink. The main selling point for this particular place appeared to be the presence of a balcony which was only slightly larger than a shoebox.

You could grow a WHOLE POT OF PARSLEY on it!

What a bargain.

Listen to this …

“The number of new home sales recorded in April grew by just 0.2%, according to the latest figures from the Housing Industry Association.

The HIA’s figures found detached house sales increased by 0.4% with gains in New South Wales and Victoria, while sales fell in Queensland, South Australia and Western Australia. Multi-unit sales recorded a third consecutive decline by 2%.

HIA chief economist Harley Dale says the result is evidence of an industry suffering under red tape and supply constraints.”

I’d say it’s also evidence that a great many people, certainly those in their 20’s and 30’s, simply couldn’t be bothered anymore attempting to hitch the wagon of their lives to an impossible mortgage that would have them living off tomato sauce and crackers for thirty years and have just given up.

Now, typically at this point in any conversation about the price of real estate, some dreary cunt will pop their head from the murk to gibber at all and sundry about how “they’ve managed to buy a house, they’ve bought three, and that’s because they worked hard, they worked really, really hard, harder than anyone else and certainly much harder than you, and they saved their money, they saved it all, and they ate beans from a can for twelve years and wore the same pair of underpants every day for a decade, whereas these days, these young people, they spend all their fucking money on plasma televisions and iPods and having fucking beers with their friends on a Friday fucking night and then they go and waste more fucking money on a fucking kebab with the fucking lot the indulgent fucking cunts and yes you can fucking buy a fucking house I did it why can’t you fucking do it it’s because you’re a lazy fucking goose that’s why it’s because you’re a lazy fucking goose and it serves you right you fucking farting fucker.”

And typically at this point in the conversation, after belting said dickhead upside the head with a mallet about forty times, you point out to said dickhead that,” Yes, you did manage to buy three, but you bought the fucking things in 1988 or thereabouts, dickhead.”

After which, you belt dickhead upside the head with a mallet again.

Houses are grossly overvalued. About 56% overvalued.

By that measure, the two bedroom ratbox across the hall from me was actually worth about 220K when it sold, and that sounds about right for what it is, which is exactly the same as the one I’m renting, and the one I’m renting ain’t nothin’ special, believe me.

You pay 56% more for a thing than it’s worth, you are a fool.

And those real estate spruikers and advisors and investors who expect you to pay 56% more for a thing than it’s worth are little more than the Limehouse Chappies and Ocean-Liner Al’s of today in modern dress shilling a Big Con, a Sting of wondrous dimensions, and it’s about time to tell these Gondorff grifters and shysters to take their overpriced shoeboxes and over-dramatic gibberish about how everybody needs to buy a house and buy NOW! NOW! NOW! just to get into the market before it’s too late and you wind up a third-class citizen because you only rent to shove it all up their backsides and go take a flying fuck at the moon, because interpreting an “easement” of 0.3% as a “slump” of any sort and touting this as “news worthy” is complete and utter bullshit.

Someone did pay 500 grand for that unit across the hall from me.

The poor, silly bastards.

I wonder if they drink and own a gun?

This “report” informs me that “healthy choice” food options in fast food chains are moving slower than a eunuch’s dick in a whorehouse and that this is a shame.

And I am moved to wonder.

I feel that my mind is slowly being clusterfucked into a piss-streaked gloopy puddle of dead, gelatinous jism by a persistently noisy gaggle of gibbering dickheads, all of whom regularly feel that their mere existence in this world upon which I stagger entitles them to poke their fingers into the slowly diminishing spongy spillage that is my brain and waggle them about some before scooping it up in a tissue and flushing it into the sea.

I imagine this scenario …

“Dad! Dad!”, shouts the excitable little boy in the ever-so-gorgeous Superman costume, “Can we go to McDonalds for dinner tonight?!”

“Why, of course we can, son!”, replies Dad, all Brylcreem and respectable gray slacks belted at the nipples, he’s Fred MacMurray on steroids, he has a maid who cooks and cleans every day, she has folksy homilies on tap, you wouldn’t fuck her with a bag over your head via remote control even if you could.

“But only as a special treat, you mind! This is not a regular thing!”, says Dad, hitching his pants up to his neck and pulling the belt tight as it will go, a little spontaneous auto-erotic asphyxiation while junior’s washing his hands and poking about his earholes with a fluffy stick before a nice meal out never hurt anyone, whoopsy-daisy, there she blows!.

And then they arrive, and our excitable tyke rushes up to the counter and gazes longingly at the vast array of tempting comestibles on offer, all oozing, juicy meats and cheeses and buns and salt and sugar and stuff that bears no known relationship to any existing foodstuff but it’s served in fucking buckets TEN FEET HIGH! and our adorably innocent little boy-scout supreme looks back at his Dad who’s now wandered up to the counter and joined him.

“Take your pick, son!”, says Dad, gazing adorably at the pride of his now empty old gray testicles.

And our cute as a button little fella, why you could almost take him home with you and chain him to a chair in a locked room that’s covered all over with dinosaur wallpaper and throw bloody big boxes of Lego at him until he cracks and agrees to be your son and help you hand out pamphlets at the abortion clinic for the rest of his life, he looks up at Dad, a little tentative, a little anxious, and then he blurts out the one true desire of his sweet young heart on this oh-so-special of nights …

“CAN I HAVE THE APPLE IN A BAG?!?!?”

“Why, of course you can, son!”, says our Father of the Year, “But only as a special treat, you mind! This is not a regular thing!”.

And a fine night was had by all.

Listen …

A person wants a fucking apple, they go to a fucking grocer.

Let’s all try living in the world, yes?

Enjoy.