Also, the shrinking news coverage in north Queensland gets a double whammy this week … details shortly.
But if that’s a sign of tough times, at least our own Townsville Bulletin has hit on a smart way to save on space, and thus make the paper (or at least the website) more compact. Just eliminate those annoying gaps between words!
Probably won’t catch on.
There was a somewhat spectacular ‘what was she thinking?’ moment for local political wannabee Cathy O’Toole, who has proved before to have a few problems with the PR side of campaigning. Getting the message out is fraught with political peril.
Ms O’Toole was a guest speaker at a recent Queensland Council of Unions bunfight, and she so liked the photographs, she somehow decided to use one prominently in her latest campaigning newsletter seeking the membership support for her bid to be pre-selected to take on Ewen Jones at the next federal poll. She presumably figured it would be one in the eye for her challenger for preselection, Patricia Schluter, but since Cathy published it herself, it looks more like an own goal.
Not quite what the faithful would want to see from a selfless warrior for the Labor left … but maybe not a surprise from someone seeking Dumbo Jumbo’s seat on the gravy train.
(To point out that this is no photoshop jibe – she did sent it out herself – here is a wider shot of the lectern.)
Another mixed message has intrigued Bentley this week.
One could be excused for thinking that thespian Johnny Depp has more in common with the swaying, slurring Jack Sparrow that artistic license demands. It is reported that after his drama with a mysteriously injured hand (no, Mongrel, your theory is doubtful given the presence of his delightful squeeze du jour Amber Heard – actually his wife but hey, it’s Hollywood), then the terrier threat of Pistol and Boo, finally there are reports this week that he’s stormed off the Pirates of the Caribbean set and is ready to amble back to Amber for some R&R
(And no, Mongrel, that particular Aussie word is not one of the two Rs in R&R but one gets your drift – unfortunately).
While we’re in Deppity’s Dogs territory, Pistol and Boo made world headlines and comedians had a field day with Boofhead Barnaby’s ‘bugger off’ comment. And none were better than this one from JOHN OLIVER on the America’s Last Week Tonight.
Moving on, and a quick visit to the national stage.
It’s a crowded field, but the Selective Amnesia Award goes to the athletic Wingnut Abbott, who has set the bar higher for back-flipping with a revolutionary technique. He grandly announced mid-week that despite there being strident calls for an inquiry into the Australian mining industry, no inquiry would be held. That was sort of giving yourself an uppercut, because although our PM neglected to mention it, that strident call came from … himself!
On Friday (May 15) Crikey.com reports that Abbott took the running from Senator Nick Xenophon and said we ‘needed’ such an inquiry. And that remained his line last Monday.
But yesterday, after Joe Hockey issued a statement briefly and bluntly saying there wouldn’t be any mining inquiry, the PM had reporters scratching their heads when he chimed in with ‘ Obviously there have been some very public calls for an inquiry, but we have made a decision that there was no need for it at this time’.
Well, calls don’t get much more public than the Prime Minister himself making the initial call. But The ‘Pie thinks it nice of our PM to share with us his private conversations with himself. Let’s face it, KRudd did it every day.
On the local scene, praise must go to Mayor Mullet – her’s was anything but a mixed message to other councillors – it was a basic ‘get stuffed’ when they wanted to know if a report that she was planning for a 1% rate rise in the forthcoming budget was true. No muckin’ around there, which cannot be said for The Astonisher or Master Anthony Galoot Galloway
Reporter Anthony ‘Galoot’ Galloway
The Galoot reported the 1% figure as coming from a well placed and reliable source, but to ensure no one actually realized it was the mayor herself, our cub reporter suggested it was from a disgruntled council employee. He’s a kidder, isn’t he? A classic Mullet technique of testing the wind with a populist try-on through a political toy boy. If true, it would probably mean cuts of up to $50million in infrastructure costs. TCC budgets are such fun.
But Galoot Galloway has had a fretful week. When in town, treasurer Joe Hockey decided to be consistent in yet again pointing out that, as he has maintained for more than a year now, the Feds aren’t into building money-sinkholes called footy stadiums, that’s state business. One has to suppose that the Astonisher gets points for consistency too, condemning the treasurer for not seeing the wisdom of Lozza Lancini’s shimmering vision of a CBD stadium above all else.
The Galoot suggested that Joe was contradicting his own Prime Minister, who, according to Galloway, had backed fed money for the stadium. Actually Abbott did no such thing, as anybody who reads English and understands politics well knows.
The ring … the ring … oh, my precious.
But The Magpie is fascinated with this statement from Jolly Joe, well into the story.
‘We are prepared to look at the entire (Ross Creek waterfront) precinct which has the capacity to have more commercial space and further development that lifts the productive potential of Townsville.’
Translation: he is interested in those parts of the overall project that MAKE MONEY and CREATE JOBS. But when this was put to Iditor Heywood, the result was a stalemate.
The ‘Pie may be wide of the mark here, but surely the angle that the federal treasurer backs funding for TWO THIRDS+ of the overall project should be welcomed, lauded and hailed as a breakthrough. Front page, even? It probably would’ve been so, had not the Galoot and Iditor Pinocchio Heywood remained in the thrall of Lozza Lancini and his obsession with a stand alone stadium.
But we have to stay with the Astonisher for the hilarious Ironyman Award if the Week, which is in fact the Ironywoman Award this time around. It goes to columnist Victoria Nugent, who, through no fault of her own, appeared online thus.
Ms Nugent, who appears to be one of the few grown-ups who work at the paper, wrote an unobjectionable piece about the dangers of ‘click-bait’ stories in newspapers and news sites (dear Mystifed of Mysterton … click bait is a teasing overblown headline to make you click into the story) – in this case, all the pointless flummery about Rebel Wilson’s real age (37, which turns out to be exactly the number of centimetres around her left ankle).
But right above Ms Nugent’s plaintive cry of ‘stop giving me the shits‘ (irony one), the readers were given a great steaming dollop of same with the truly juvenile non-story PR puff piece with that pretty totty and her ‘dirty little secret’ (irony two). That secret turned out that she sneaked a look at the movie ‘Dirty Dancing’ as a 7-year-old, watching it when her parents weren’t around because she thought it might be ‘naughty’. No naughtiness and really no ‘dirty little secret’ but became hooked on ‘dirty’ dancing from then on. She now stars in the stage show. Well, I never, the little minx!! Yawn.
So while Ms Nugent’s message was unambiguous, the Astonisher manages to spectacularly mix up matters of policy and taste – just another day at the office.
Makes one wonder how long it will be before the Townsville Bulletin follows the example of the North West Star.
Owners Fairfax Media have announced that tough times will see the Mt Isa paper published just three days a week from now on. And WIN News announced it will no longer do a Mackay edition of its regional news.
Moving on.
The vexed question of racism in America has got a lot of people jumpy around the coppers. Yes, everybody, everywhere.
Wafting into the nest this week, some wisdom from the stoic old American Indians, which would be funnier if it wasn’t so true.
The Dead Horse Theory of Bureaucracy:
The tribal wisdom of the Plains Indians, passed on from generation to generation, says that “When you discover that you are riding a dead horse, the best strategy is to dismount.”
However, in government more advanced strategies are often employed, such as:
1. Buying a stronger whip.
2. Changing riders.
3. Appointing a committee to study the horse.
4. Arranging to visit other countries to see how other cultures ride dead horses.
5. Lowering the standards so that dead horses can be included.
6. Reclassifying the dead horse as living-impaired.
7. Hiring outside contractors to ride the dead horse.
8. Harnessing several dead horses together to increase speed.
9. Providing additional funding and/or training to increase the dead horse’s performance.
10. Doing a productivity study to see if lighter riders would improve the dead horse’s performance.
11. Declaring that as the dead horse does not have to be fed, it is less costly, carries lower overhead and
therefore contributes substantially more to the bottom line of the economy than do some other horses.
12. Rewriting the expected performance requirements for all horses.
And, of course…
13. Promoting the dead horse to a supervisory position.
And finally, a clever (read chauvinistic) Wititude … but be warned, it’s a ‘rude tude’ … but what the hell, it’s funny.
