Is there no steepness in the stairs to hell?

The Herald-Sun is plumbing new depths:

Boat people in our suburbs

Jessica Marszalek and Simon Benson November 26, 2011 12:00AM

THOUSANDS of asylum seekers are expected to flood the suburbs as the Federal Government rolls out bridging visas allowing boat people to live and work in the community and collect welfare.

Immigration Minister Chris Bowen has handed out the first bridging visas for 27 men, mostly Afghans and Sri Lankans, whose refugee claims are being assessed.

Mr Bowen said the men would be released from detention centres, including Melbourne, in coming days - with 100 a month to follow.

It comes as a secret government briefing note seen by the Herald Sun suggests thousands of boat people will soon be transferred into the community.

The NSW Government note reports a warning by the Immigration Department this week that arrivals will balloon when word spreads that asylum seekers arriving by boat are no longer to be held in detention.

"Once it is widely known that IMAs will live in the community while being processed, the level of entries into Australia are very likely to escalate," the note said.

Flood? FLOOD? At 1200 per year for Australia that's fewer than ten per electorate, two to a municipality, half a refugee to a POSTCODE, dammit. And most postcodes run to several suburbs. Hardly a drizzle, even with clumping.

I have actually said that.

From Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal.

Thes ridiculus

From an old THES:

What's your poison?


4 October 2002

A novel nomination in the search for outstandingly obscure journals has arrived. Chris Borthwick, a journal editor for the Australian VicHealth organisation, writes: "My nomination would be the Journal of Conspiracy Studies mentioned in a work by Thomas Pynchon; he referenced an article from it with the footnote: 'Unfortunately, back files of this journal have mysteriously disappeared from all major libraries.' Even more suspicious, a rapid riffle through all my Pynchons has failed to come up with the actual quotation."

Meanwhile, two entries have been disqualified. The Journal of Bee Venom Therapy is a personal diary rather than an academic journal, while Esperanto Sub La Suda Kruco is simply the newsletter of the Esperanto association of Australia.

To submit an entry, send pertinent information to steve.farrar@thes.co.uk or marca@ chem2.harvard.edu . They are also looking for a Japanese translator to enable them to contact the publishers of the Journal of Fish Sausage .

Can't find it on Google, either. Proof positive.

Perhaps he could be Robin to Palin's Batman

HERMAN CAIN:: What? Over? Did you say "over"? Nothing is over until we decide it is! Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor? Hell no!

Grammar: good servant, bad master

Sexual side to push on equality

(Australian, 4/11/11)
Took me some while to work out that I couldn't join the sexual side.

Miss GG

Demme. Mississippi has a Governor-General. An elected office, evidently. Presumably it's the Governor - but they do say Governor-General. And a GG, one would think, would have to have a couple of Governors under him, and it's hard to see where they'd come from in Mississippi.

Unless it's like being an archbishop, of course.


Doesn't score in the Constitution. Just 'Governor'.

By George, I've got it

When Herman Cain refers to

"the one thing that I remember" is the "you're the same height as my wife, because my wife comes up to my chin" bit

it's the dialogue for a scenario where he puts his hand over her head and presses down slightly.

Speaking of medals

There's a tiny fuss in the US because one rightwinger has put out a Support-Our-Troops flyer with a picture of a Soviet officer -

Mind you, it's perfectly appropriate to thank one of the veterans of the Great Patriotic War: they saved enough American troops (if that was your goal) to justify any benisons. And if they were at the same time supporting Stalinism, that just brings up the issue of whether soldiers are responsible for the crimes of their masters; which would raise other questions in an American context.

Dear Dead Days

The British Empire Medal (BEM), which was awarded as part of the Queen's Honours system to British citizens making a difference in their communities until 1992, will be reintroduced in the Diamond Jubilee Honours list in June next year.
Associated with the Order of the British Empire (OBE), the BEM was established in the same year, 1917, and was once known as "the working class gong". It was originally split into two medals - one for exceptional civil service, and one for military gallantry and was awarded to those who did not qualify to be made a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE).

Do you suppose Austria still hands out the Austro-Hungarian Empire Medal?

Age bin - refugees

If any Australian government genuinely wanted to reduce the number of refugees who drown on the way here, it could easily do so. Refugees come here in unseaworthy boats because the boats are confiscated and burnt when they arrive, which means that passage money has to cover the whole cost of the boat, which means they can’t afford much in the way of waterproofing and lifebelts (if all airline flights were incinerated on landing we’d all be flying in cheaper and more rickety planes). If Indonesian fishermen got their boats back the refugees would be up only for rental costs and thus could afford a much safer class of boat. Children are drowning because it’s Australia’s deliberate policy; we would rather they died than that we ran the risk of encouraging more boats.