The Orthodox Stench of Corruption

Shane in Ferns

G'day Possums,

Mrs Wombat and I had a little sojourn in "Warby" recently and it reminded us somewhat of the town of Glastonbury in England.

All the pics that follow are from its surrounds.

The Ruling Rabble, fellow-traveller apparatchiks and other assorted entitled had a memoriam, a get-together some weeks ago to eulogise their hero and Liberal Party founder, "Ming Menzies" and his "Forgotten People" speech. That in their orthodoxy they had their dates wrong and their "memoriam" was a historical confection was of no import to them;  particularly "Mings" adulation of Hitler prior to the war and who as PM was selling iron to the Japanese just before WW2, hence his sobriquet, "Pig-Iron Bob:" and also the fact that he "went missing" in London for months, leaving Australia completely unprepared for the coming Pacific conflict was of no relevance to them in their re-enactment.

What matters most to the Ruling Rabble is the public facade of respectability, the pretence of fiscal rectitude and the impression of solidity.

This fractured orthodoxy was well demonstrated recently when the monies paid to the ineligible and now sacked right-wing Senator, Bob Day (apparently $130,000.00) have been "forgiven," but the data matching program informed private debt collectors are still chasing down citizen's welfare debts as miniscule as $20.00 with pensioners being hunted, too.

Don't do as I do, do as I say. 

Double standards = Orthodoxy.

 

Warburton

Enter, stage right: Trade Minister Andrew, Reboxetine Robb. 

Paid $100,000.00 by a Chinese businessman for his election funding. The day before the Federal election, he signed up to a $880,000.00 pa job with the same Chinese firms who months before were awarded a 99 year lease on the Port of Darwin. Subsequently, one month after being elected Reboxetine leaves parliament!

As this little piece of chicanery was a trifle more news and noteworthy than Silly Sam Dastyari's $5500.00 worth of Chinese "donations," prime miniature Truffles, worried that the stench of their orthodoxy was becoming more apparent:  Asbestos Bishop also had her "seat" warmed to the tune of $800,000.00 of Chinese electoral munificence too,  found some 5 minutes of solace in a desperate "Look-Over-There" moment by blaming Tardis State premier Dan-the-Man Andrews for the Victorian parole board's decision to parole an ice-addled criminal nutter who, claiming allegiance to both Islamic State and Al Queada,(?) murders an innocent man, takes a woman hostage and wounds three policemen before himself being shot and killed.

What a saviour of probity is "terrorism," eh?

 

Warburton

It's a Ballarat tradition... there's a Prime Minister's walk in the botanic gardens on Lake Wendouree with portrait busts of all the country's PM's.

It may be unfortunate for the nation that Rabid-the Hun, Abbott ever existed but now he too is there in effigy, stiffly fouling the rural environment. 

Sometimes we need to be reminded of our electoral and educational failings.

Interestingly, Julia Gillard's portrait in this line-up was once the most attacked and defiled but as Rabid's has already had a crown of onions adorn it, I dare say petals, that attention to his visage might well soon overtake that of his bete' noire's.

 

Warburton

Watching The Drum (ABC) recently I was again struck how the orthodoxy of opinion has become the mere rote of the narrow, neo-conservative.

Discussing Corbyn's almost victory in the British elections all of the panel, left and right (what was that faecal matter from Quadrant, Cater, doing there btw?) were happily repeating their truisms of how unelectable Corbyn was seemingly oblivious to the fact  that their opinions did not in any way, accord with the reality of the vote!

This is what I had noted during our last federal election:

"Early in the evening during the election broadcast I was looking at the performances of Sales, Uhlmann and Crabb and also noting the growing number of seats that were falling to Labor and sensed that "something is up here" but this panel kept blithely brown-nosing Scummo and often interrupting and ignoring Wong until : Bang: 1,2,3, Tassie seats had gone, then suddenly they were all at sea having to deal with a reality that was way out of their comfort zones. They never recovered and their bias' took a battering for the rest of the night."

http://shanewombat.blogspot.com.au/2016/07/not-with-bang-but-whimper.html

Warburton

The smug, self satisfied repetition of ruling rabble assertions as question, the mindless repetition of neo-liberal theory as substitute for discussion, the banality of the current orthodoxy is deadening debate and dumbing further down a nation not generally noted for the liveliness of its thinking.

 When you see Fictions Frydenberg allowed to blather on nonsensically about energy costs and the failures of a privatized market being the fault of the alternative energy producers and then his opposition being question-cajoled into agreeing to the same you know you're witnessing the proliferation of propaganda by a player not a journalist.

When you hear constant commentary that there is partisan agreement to Finkel's energy review before it is even released you know that you are listening to the softening-up propaganda of what-you-must-believe. Personal opinion and analysis is being corrupted from the start.

When you have to suffer through Andrew Probyn's (ABC 7.30) sing-song "opinion" homily's attempting to rhapsodise right-wing cant ..Oi!

But for once you can only agree... he can't!

Better that Probyn, be given time off to study a talent; a real wordsmith of popular culture like Clive James and discover that James knew not just his word's worth but that with them he drew from reality succinct images of value and meaning.

Warburton

It has been said that The Ugly American, Murdoch stormed out in high dudgeon from The Daily Mail's London election room as the exit polls began suggesting that his vituperative campaign against Corbyn had failed miserably..... I hope that is true. 

I wonder too, if Lynton Crosby is feeling aggrieved again?

Two elections old boy, two flops....times up?

 

Warburton

"There was a crooked man and he walked a crooked mile.

He found a crooked sixpence upon a crooked stile.

He bought a crooked cat which caught a crooked mouse,

And they all lived together in a little crooked house.

 

Warburton

Hoo-roo possums

Shane

Theatre of the Absurd

G'day  Petals,

We all went off to a rally recently. We were showing support for 230 refugees and their 37 babies who are about to be shipped back to the concentration camps on Nauru. Some of them have terminal illnesses and one young boy who was raped before coming here will be sent back to the same danger.

Head Public Servant Fascist Of Border Farce,  Mike Pelluzzo refused to answer questions in a Senate enquiry, instead, criticizing the media (particularly the ABC) as being advocates for activism.... Hmm.. pot calling kettle, black bum?

Here is a public servant displaying a completely partisan attitude. He should be sacked.

He was followed by the military who also refused to answer anything asked of them... hmmm... servants of the people or again, partisan activists for the ruling rabble? What seems certain is that the navy is breaching international boundaries in towing refugee boats back to Indonesia.

refugee rally

What a malignant ruling rabble.

Phillip Ruddock is to be Human Rights envoy to UN... this to the man that Amnesty International requested  not wear their badge after the "Tampa" criminality and the lies of the "Children Overboard" corruption. He's also the Attorney General who opined that sleep-deprivation wasn't torture.

refugee rally melbourne

Un-Environment Minister, Ozone-Hole Hunt has been awarded the inaugural Best Minister of Good Governance award. That it was in Dubai and that this incompetent has seen Australia increase its Carbon emissions by 1.3%  under his gormless lack of activity, has also allowed suspending protection to 1.3 Million sq km of marine park and dredging wastes to be dumped on the Great Barrier Reef, appointed a wind-farm Commissioner whose part-time work costs $205,000.00 and seen investments in re-newables driven down by 88%,  says much of its worth. 

Senator Scott Ludlum (Greens)  got it pretty right when he quipped that his mother had probably given "Ozone-Hole" the award.

Elizabeth St Melbourne

Stuart Robert, Assistant Defence Minister is caught out  doing a fiddle for a Liarbril Party donor's business in China (one in which  has shares, btw) ... and is supported by Arfur "Da Spiv" Sinodinas.    Well, what else do you expect from some-one, who as treasurer of Liarbril fundraising  answered "I can't recall" 18 times to a Royal Commission into illegal fundraising?

And the press are being unusually quiet about the half dozen Liarbril pollies (including failed ex prime miniature, Rabid-the-Hun) accepting bribes of Rolex watches from Chinese Billionaires!

Hmmm if it had been Unionists there would be a Royal Commission called.

Albert St Brunswick

Then came the news that "Reboxetine" Robb is jumping ship and resigning at the next election to top up his parliamentary "super" by working for private industry.

Funny... I thought that's what he was doing with selling out our sovereignty in signing the TPP!

In an interview with Faine on 774, Rebox  told us what good shape his party is in and how wonderful the economy was..... as Faine later observed with Barry Cassidy, if it was the Labor Party brawling as the Liarbrils are doing at the moment it would be front page splashes... and all The Ugly American's rag's and "columnists" and commentators like Bolt, Devine, Hadley and Jones would be frothing at the mouth about disunity, lack of direction, turmoil and incompetence. 

And it's funny too how with the deficit doubled, unemployment about to soar and  trade terms woeful, Rebox thinks the economy is sailing along.... hmmm, delusional?

If this economy is good, then it must have been brilliant under Labor....and not the mess the Liarbrils continually said it was.

Albert St Brunswick

Remember when we were told that getting rid of the Carbon Pricing mechanism would make electricity prices would fall ? Well they have gone up 61% !

"Barnyard" Joyce has been made leader of the "Notionals." He who thinks Marriage Equality will harm our live Beef export trade with Asia and made a fool of himself  and the nation over-reacting to Depp's Dogs and who has spent over a million dollars in entitlements in 12 months, is now Deputy PM. He calls himself an Agrarian Socialist but supports free markets.  The circus that is the ruling rabble now has a new assistant clown!

See... it's Theatre of the Absurd...from Orwellian duplicity through the surrealist imaginings of Kafka to this!

Hoo-roo Possums,

Shane.

..and it's only January

Shane in the Sun

G’day Possums,

In another blow to the democratic process it has become known that both the recently resigned technology writer for the ABC, Nick Ross and “Lateline” presenter Emma Albirici were effectively gagged from criticizing Malcon Turdball-fop’s outdated, overtime and cobbled together NBN technology’s as a too expensive mess. 

Apparently anytime Turdball-Fop appeared on "QandA" critical questions both from the audience and online about the NBN have been vetted.

What's that you say about the "Left-Wing" bias at the ABC? And to see why Ross and Alberici were muzzled ......  http://www.abc.net.au/technology/articles/2013/02/21/3695094.htm

The cost to the nation not just in monetary terms but of progress in health and education just to appease the wishes of “The Ugly American” Murdoch is another disgraceful indication that this ruling rabble are really just the puppets of vested interests. 

 It almost as disgraceful that Turdball-Fop has interests in 2 overseas companies who are rolling out systems similar the Labor plan he has dismantled.
This is the act of a Quisling.

Public education has been gutted of $600,000,000.00 and this innovation pretender is cutting alternative technologies back…but it’s a great time to be a millionaire!

Williamstown

Sussan “Flappy-Mouth” Ley Minister for Un-Health has decided that if you have cancer, diabetes, kidney problems or anything else, you will have to pay for any pathology tests you may require. In another demonstration of her unsuitability, (she is Sports Minister as well) as a human, “Flappy-Mouth” criticized Labor for instigating the investigation into the doping scandal at Essendon Football club which has resulted in 34 players being banned from playing for twelve months. Like many of the ruling rabble, ethics is not something she is familiar with.

Williamstown

Stench is bubbling to the surface with the TPP, too. It appears, as details slowly emerge, that “Reboxetine” Robb has dudded the nation; but then he is a Liarbril so what else do you expect?

There will be far fewer jobs than have been touted and it is expected that a 0.02% growth in the economy will result. Allied with Investor Trade Dispute Mechanisms the country will be stuffed.

Greendale Sky

Uncle Otto’s boy, Eric “Vichy” Abetz and Kevin “Medieval” Andrews are stirring the war pot to make themselves look brave and patriotic….but not relevant.

“Barnyard” Joyce has announced he’s ready for the leadership of the Notional’s. I’m not sure why he wants us all to return to an agrarian feudal system run by 457 visa workers on $2.00 per hour when Turdball-Fop is busy implementing Rabid-the-Hun’s IPA directives to replicate early C19th social, medical and industrial practices but many laughed at his ambition.... but not at the $1,300,000.00 he spent in "entitlements"!

Speaking of Rabid… he still thinks he’s go some clout and has offered Mr Peta “Bloody Idiot” Credlin  (Brian Loughnane) as a candidate for Ambassador to the Vatican… perhaps this is a way to hide him from the fallout that is bound to happen when thuggish ex campaign director Damien “Light-Fingers” Mantach hits court to defend himself from the allegation that he ripped-off the Liarbril Party in two states to the tune of nearly $2,000,000.00?

Mr Credlin would be able to keep another hiding there, Cardinal “The Graceless” Pell company or perhaps help him with his tours around the place as he is too unwell to return to Australia to face the RC in child abuse.

Sort of makes Thommo’s $6,000.00 fraud look trite!

Greendale Sky

And then we will have the pleasure of waiting to see how that Liarbril doyen of the Union movement, Kathy Jackson and her dubious B/F fare over the $2,500,000.00 she is alleged to have filched…..

And it’s only January!

Hoor-roo Petals,

Shane

Seeing people of privilege…

Shane at ballet Studio

G’day Petals,

Japanese Photographer Moriyama Daido has said the photographs are memories of light and deposits and traces making up a kind of archaeology and he likes Tennessee Williams' thought “….that worthwhile memories lie somewhere between fact and non-fact.”

Photos taken recently at class and rehearsal for Ballet Theatre Australia... They have a performance soon.. check their facebook page for details... https://www.facebook.com/BalletTheatreAustralia

These are not documentary photographs, yet they are…

They are a fiction but still true.

A dance performance is ephemeral, it is always enjoyed after the event.

 They are not “staged” images but manipulated truth.

Wombat Droppings

Scott “The Drone “ Morrison has used refugee children on the Manus Island concentration camp as bargaining ploys to get legislation passed through the Senate under the pretence that it is “humanitarian.”

Rabid –the-Hun with his usual warped values applauded this a fair and honourable thing to do.

That he has a brain is without doubt.... but it must be very small, hence the repetitive simple three word slogans. They’re repetitive because it’s almost as if he's trying to convince himself of their "rightness" and viability.

What a bastard nation we have become. What a venal, selfish, intolerant and stupid people; a Nation so without a set of moral values that we are going to be easy pickings for the next huckster that comes along.

A young cricketer got hit on the head with a ball during a State match and tragically, died.
A young woman with severe physical disabilities who was a forceful advocate for seeing disability for what it is died, suddenly.
The Australian Cricket Board and its cricketers had the cricketer's funeral televised (politicians of all persuasions attended) and "Milked" at every opportunity the situation.
I don't think the disability advocate will get the same attention.
Advance Australia ...where?

Then there was the rather sad spectacle of our newish taxpayer funded $330,000.00 p.a. ”Freedom from Something” Commissioner, Timmy “Twat/Freedom-Man” (ex-Liarbril, ex-Coot-With-Queer-Ideas-From-a-Parallel-Universe”, aka IPA) bouncing around the set of “The Chasers Media Circus” on the soon to be financially gutted, ABC.

Looking, according to Mrs Wombat’s analysis, like a dippy school–girl invited to a party where she knows no-one and senses she is not liked but is so, so desperate to be involved, Timmy offered little of substance but seemed blithely happy to be a clapping wallflower to everyone else’s contributions.

Perhaps more than a real civil servant working for the betterment of the nation’s civility would do?

Me?   I thought Timmy looked more like a dim-witted Labrador dog happily sniffing new bums in the hope a being accepted by the peer group.

Timmy’s previous employment was with that rancid organization the IPA  which in its paid advocacy role espouses abolishing the very commission for which Timmy is now being paid by the nation to speak for. That is the real problem and his appointment rather, foisting, without tender into the role, by pretend Federal Attorney General, “Bookshelves” Brandis, makes a mockery of Democracy.

He can never be trusted in this role.

 Almost on cue as the wheels begin to fall off their ramshackle government; we are treated to more news “shock, horror, feel afraid”,  70 or so Australian Muslims are fighting with ISIS in Syria & Iraq and Mandy “Il Patrone” Vanstone bounces up to opine how hard-done-by her rabble are being treated by the press and Labor.

Geez, Mandy do you now sympathise with the viciousness your lot meted to Gillard and Rudd in the past few years? Do you think Mandy, that your rabble’s top level infighting is the press’ and Labor’s fault?

The infighting is getting worse as their wholly unfair budget is in a mess, their ludicrous tertiary education dismemberment is stalled in the Senate and Rabid-the-Hun’s popularity deteriorates.

Julie “Death-Stare” Bishop then has a hissy fit when told she can’t go the Climate Change talks in Lima.

They weren’t going to have Australia attend as “Ozone-Hole” Hunt is useless as Environment minister and besides “…climate change is crap…!”

 “Death-Stare” with one look, irradiated a cabinet room of colleagues and gets her way but is further informed (probably by Rabid-the-Hun’s most favoured partner, “Commissar” Credlin) that Andy “Reboxetine” Robb was to chaperone her, lest she swayed from the righteous doctrinal path of  “…climate change is crap…” and not hinder the de-railing of the talks.

It was reported that “Death-Stare, “…went Bananas…” Not, that she was Bananas.

That Julie “Death-Stare Bishop’s star is in the ascendant is not disputed but that is a bit like a flag being run up the mast of the Titanic as it sinks.

“People of privilege,” said the economist JK Galbraith, “will always risk their complete destruction rather than surrender any material part of their advantage.”

And so it goes Down-Under.

Hoo-roo Possums,

Shane

with weeping and gnashing of teeth

with weeping and gnashing of teeth...

Shane with books of negs

G'day you two,

we've spent the last couple of weeks scanning all 591 negative sheets from the Ballet School from many years ago... a somewhat large task

old shots

Not long after the “The School’s” 50^th Anniversary get-together one of the participants, Deanna Watson contacted me to see A/ whether the photos of her she saw displayed were mine and, B/ did I have any more?

Answering “No” and “Yes,” I invited Deanna to view the files I had but as the majority of the early work had never been “proofed” it could only be viewed from the original negatives, which is difficult particularly for anyone not used to reading B&W negatives.

Then a couple more contacts followed also enquiring about their time at The School and at the launch of Maggie Scott’s biography, writer Michelle Potter evinced sufficient interest in this archive, as did some other notable alumnae present to warrant scanning all the work and making it available for those interested in viewing it.

There has since been a deal of interest in this archive and I'm pondering what to do with it ...

Australian Ballet School 1970

There's more info at  danceatthearchive.blogspot.com.au

Then we happened across Troy Barrett performing nicely at the Royal Mail hotel in Bacchus Marsh and took a couple of pics...

Troy Barrett

He's also online at  www.troybarrettmusic.com  where you can have a listen and download some samples.

Wombat Droppings
a chronicle of the disappearing of Egalitarianism and the inexorable rise of Fascism in Australia.

Well, Pretend Premier Dennis "Dodo" (Genus: Inutilus Rusticus) Napthine has been put to sleep. With Labor's Daniel Andrews administering the possible cure of the "Tardis" State's (Where-All-Goes-Backwards) woes... even to the extent of the Nationals looking like they will lose party status, also losing a seat held for 47 years to an independent.

Of course Rabid-the-Hun and his rabble take no responsibility for any of this but then telling "Porkies" is about all they're good at.
But there is much wailing and gnashing of teeth....
A defence Minister who talks down his own defence workforce, an Education minister who can't pronounce the names of those he's trying to bully into accepting $100,000.00 University fees, a Health Minister attempting to wreck one of the worlds best health systems and an Environment minister ...Oohh, just let's not go there....but let's not forget our Trade Minister, Andrew "Reboxetine" Robb giving away Oz jobs to the Chinese and signing off on having Multi-Nationals tell us what we can and can't do.

To say that the country is becoming a shambles is not overstating it.
The finest example of this shambles is the Federal parliament's Speaker, Bronwen "Kerosene-Pompador" Bishop who has ejected Labor opposition members a total of 285 times to Government members 5 times. Sometimes they are just asking a question... I know I have railed and ranted much about this putrid lot but there in no untruth in what I've said and unfortunately I've been pretty accurate as to the way I said things would turn out.

On election day I spent four hours handing out "How-to-Vote" cards at an Electoral booth
as well as having fun "winding-up" the Liarbrils  doing the same.
This has become a very divided country. A place that is fearful, reactionary, selfish and let's not mince words, stupid!
The Liarbrils had no plan for government. All they had was ideology and the far right "Free-Market" handbook supplied by the "Coot's-With-Queer-Ideas-From-a-Parallel-Universe," the IPA.
It doesn't work.
Only as a recipe for social dysfunction... that 's the only bit that's working for them!

Even their polling and tactical Svengali, Mark Textor knows that the hole they have dug themselves into is now almost too big to get out of .
The problem with that is that their hallmark nastily feral, brutish, and vindictive characters will extend to slashing about at anything in frustration, bloody-mindedness and sheer malice.
There are dark days ahead.
Hoo-roo Petals,
Shane