Big Green Ogres

Don Quixote: Has trouble distinguishing between giants and windmills.

Alan Moir: Has trouble distinguishing between dragons and giants.

Andjam: Has trouble distinguishing Alan Moir and Margo Kingston from employees of Der Sturmer.

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Moral equivalence of the week goes to Tim Dunlop:

Let's put that another way: al Qaeda "do their best in good faith" as far as they're concerned. It ain't an excuse.

And in this post, Julia, Tim and Garry have accused me of regarding sexual abuse as ok.

Nice work, guys.

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I can't find anything on the web, but in The Australian, Thursday July 8 2004, page 18 (Media section), there were some articles about Jim Waley wearing a flack jacket.

Nine snapped that it was only following advice from its security consultant, AKE, and that the vest was the "UN blue" favoured by news chiefs around the world to avoid confusion with anything military.

Makes you feel almost sorry for the United Nations. Almost.

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Kevin Rudd is, as far as I can tell, one of the best shadow ministers in the federal Labor party. He is bright, supported Australian troops staying in Iraq until Latham over-ruled him, and is not an extremist.

And now he's criticised Howard's policy over Taiwan, saying it was pragmatically risking democracy there in order to maintain good relations with China.

Sorry. I got that the wrong way around. Aus Opposition calls for govt to increase pressure on Taiwan:

Australia's Federal Opposition has called on the Howard Government to increase diplomatic pressure on Taiwan over its desire to declare formal independence from China.

Labor's Foreign Affairs Spokesman Kevin Rudd says tensions on the issue were running high when he was in Beijing last week for talks with Chinese officials.

It's one thing for the government to be pragmatic, but usually opposition parties are more idealistic.

Oh, and about tensions running high? It isn't Tawain planning to practise war against a neighbour.

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While the Australian Democrats did not support the invasion of Iraq, (can someone explain "They don't rely on the large scale mass media to run them, but I think as Howard Dean showed, the use of the Internet skilfully can have a big impact." to me?), they support Australia's troops staying until at least the elections.

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You've seen the movie, now join the political campaign!

MEL Gibson plans to spend more than $140,000 to keep a tiny religious cross on a government seal.

The devout Catholic will bankroll a campaign by a conservative religious group to protest against the removal of the cross on the official Los Angeles county seal.

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As halal as a ham sandwich

The Great Vegemite Airlift is being augmented by Adelaide lawyer Stephen Kenny.

Lawyer Stephen Kenny, who is based in Adelaide, will meet Hicks for three-and-a-half days from Wednesday inside the US base at Cuba - taking with him items including Vegemite and chocolates.

Hicks must be going through it at a reasonable rate, or sharing it with others, as he was sent some late last year.

Minor problem: Vegemite is no longer kosher, and therefore is probably not halal. Considering that there were over twice as many Muslims as Jews back in 1996, it is surprising that the original newspaper article didn't touch on this potential issue.

If Hicks chooses to eat haram food, especially if he's fought for a regime that beat women caught eating ice cream, the only thing that comes to mind is the quote attributed to Alfred Adler that "It is easier to fight for one's principles than to live up to them."

Of course, David Hicks will be heartbroken over not being able to eat any Vegemite other than the "small jar" he currently has, right? I mean, despite there being no mention of Vegemite being requested or sent in The President Versus David Hicks, we aren't to think this is some sort of PR stunt done by the same people who are trying to paint John Howard rather than David Hicks as the traitor, are we?

On a separate note: An Australian Navy newsletter ( http://www.navy.gov.au/foreigntraining/documents/2004WebNewsJanuaryFebruary.pdf - hyperlink awaiting Adobe Acrobat's halal certification), with advice from Defence International Training Centre, on feeding foreign Muslim students gives as a meal suggestion: "Bread with jam (definitely not vegemite because of taste)". We await with interest Al-Qaeda guidelines on feeding Australians.

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China plans to practise invading Taiwan:

CHINESE soldiers will for the first time practise a D-Day style invasion of Taiwan on a densely populated island off the mainland coast this month.

The difference with D-Day being that D-Day involved democracies invading a dictatorship.

Reports of the exercise were greeted with thousands of supportive messages yesterday in mainland internet chatrooms, a sign of the immense popularity of Beijing's policy of striving for the eventual return of Taiwan.

While I doubt that support is that strong, it is depressing how often nationalism acts as one of the pillars of dictatorship.

One said: "Taking back Taiwan by force is only a matter of time. We don't have to be afraid of the US. China is never afraid of a paper tiger."

Just like nuclear weapons were a "paper tiger".

China is concerned that Mr Chen is moving further towards declaring independence - a step that would probably trigger a Chinese military response, possibly a naval blockade.

If Taiwan wishes to declare independence, why not let it do so, and just negotiate a China-Taiwan free trade agreement?

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Animal farm:

Comrades! You do not imagine, I hope, that we pigs are doing this in
selfishness and privilege ... Milk and apples (this has been proved by science, comrades) contain substances absolutely necessary to the wellbeing of a pig. We pigs are brain workers, the organisation of the farm totally depends on us.

North Korea:

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Il has introduced one of the strongest culinary symbols of capitalist America - hamburgers and french fries - as "quality food" for students in the Stalinist state.

A hamburger factory was built in North Korea at Kim's instructions in 2000, the North Korean government newspaper, Minju Joson, said.

...

In September 2000, Kim called a senior official to say: "I've made up my mind to feed quality bread and french fries to university students, professors and researchers even if we are in hardship."

Thereafter, Kim received reports on the construction of the hamburger factory and ordered the use of up-to-date facilities for mass production, the paper said.

Hamburger factories? Not small-business fast food outlets? No doubt the North Koreans are wary about hamburgers on the grounds that it may lead to capitalism.

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Turkish hostages Murat Kizil and Soner Sercali were released last Friday after their employer, the Turkish company Kayteks, agreed to stop working for the US military.

What work were they doing for the imperialistic hedgemon?

Kayteks had supplied air conditioners for soldiers' barracks.

The terrorists have won. There's no way the soldiers will be able to withstand the brutal Iraqi summer now.

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Some over-hyped American movie by a self-obsessed stupid white man has been released recently. I decided instead to watch a foreign-language film instead.

The story is about a girl who pretends to be a boy so that she can work (there are no males in the family). The actors are non-professional (I mean by that that they've got no filmography, not that they're prima donnas). No good guys kick butt. So why see it?

Charles' comment at Little Green Footballs asking

"Has anyone noticed that, in the three years since the US homeland suffered its worst attack in history, Hollywood has not produced one single film that advocates the American side in the War On Islamic Fascism?"

has a little to do with why I saw it. It seems that virtually the only people who have made anti-Taliban films are from Afghanistan and Iran. The film has been described as the first film from Afghanistan since the fall of the Taliban (and the first since the rise of the Taliban). But I came away feeling that the movie seemed so real to me. It broke my heart to see protesting women flee when the Taliban arrived, whereas in a typical movie the women would have at least confronted them at first.

For those wondering, like I was, whether the name "Osama" was based on the person wanted in connection to bad stuff happening in September 2001, the best I can say is "quite possibly". There was a brief mention of bin Laden by one of the children being rounded up to go to a training camp.

I'm giving it a 4-star general.

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Amr Moussa once warned that war against Iraq would "open the gates of hell". One response was "Good! We'd like to get out!". But recent comments suggest the traffic is two-way:

"Please let us not be afraid by those outlaws ... Some of them have already gone to the fires of hell and others are waiting their turn."

Stupid cowboy Texan.

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