September 2009
40 posts
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Cheers and Jeers.
At the risk of appearing contrarian the Council’s decision to pull its proposed liquor policy seems to us this morning to be flipping the bird at democracy.
The draft policy which would have closed suburban bars before midnight was intensely unpopular and over the weekend John Banks and Aaron Bhatnagar abandoned it in the face of that opposition.This morning on Radio NZ Banks says he told...
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“I’m not what you call superstitious. I’m not worried about ladders...”
– Slash, guitarist, 38, Los Angeles
simonpound:
Have you ever crashed the stage and maybe broke it at a televised awards ceremony? No? Well, only an idiot would. Like me. http://bit.l …
Simon recalls a shared experience involving lots of booze, a music awards show, a revolving stage and one pissed off stage manager.
“Even more distressing, he was wearing Crocs.”
– Former Bush speech writer Matt Latimer writes of a high pressure time in George Bush’s Presidency.
At least Dubya had concerns about Palin.
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Don't Wake Putin
How far will Condé Nast go to bury an article linking Vladimir Putin to a series of 1999 bombings blamed on Chechen terrorists? Quite a bit as it turns out.
Gawker gets in on the action.
Art, Wharves and Pathology.
At this point I’m about to hand Dane Mitchell the Billy T Award for this year. His work Collateral annoyed many by virtue of it being a load of rubbish and by being awarded top prize at the annual Waikato National Contemporary Art Awards. Mitchell asked museum staff in an email to collect up the packaging from other entries and dump them in a pile. Here’s my initial thoughts on the...
WatchClever.
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Why It's All Art
So, the inevitable and reoccurring debate about what constitutes art; or, in this case, what constitutes art worth fifteen thousand dollars.
Artist Dane Mitchell’s entry into the Waikato National Contemporary Art Award was a note asking Waikato Museum staff to sweep up the packing detritus from other entries and pile them up on the floor. The resulting pile of rubbish was his entry. Judge...
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“Midnight Youth is a terrible band. They do nothing to promote New Zealand music...”
– Simon Sweetman squirts out another blog. He argues that neither Smashproof nor Midnight Youth promotes NZ music or represents NZ life. I’d argue that his blog fails in that respect as well.
And what exactly is a “NZ sound”? Perhaps Sweetman can explain his criteria?
WatchA statement followed by a few questions. Firstly, this is awesome shit, secondly why is he doing this demo in a garage by a car? A big combustible car. Also: did he get picked on at school? And will he become Q for these guys or eventually face off against them in a never-ending series of confrontations which result in Armageddon?
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Banksy Gets Painted Over →
Boos all round for the Hackney Council.
“The council’s position is not to make a judgment call on whether graffiti is art or not. Our task is to keep Hackney’s streets clean. This cleanliness is judged by the government on a number of factors including levels of graffiti.”
So not fans then, although lovers of “street art” can do just as much damage as bean...
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Two Studies On Drug Decriminalisation: One Is Not... →
Here’s a wee piece I wrote for Gordon Campbell’s online magazine Werewolf. In it I compare two different studies on Portugal’s drug decriminalisation policy.
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Just a desperate little reminder that you and your dependents can all sign up to be part of the Sunday Breakfast Email List. This is an email that goes out after the show every Sunday and contains links to podcasts of all the features and interviews that were on the show. As well as other bits and pieces including incongruous photos, rants and links to interesting stuff. It’s good for work...
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Michael Laws accused of 'bullying' pupils →
Wow, what a fucktard. Is Laws turning into this decade’s Mrs Mangle?
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“Following one of the best action sequences I’ve ever read in a comic, the Judges...”
– Garth Ennis on 200AD’s 32nd birthday and why The Apocalypse War kept him up at night
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Producer protests screening of Chinese programme
Link
What exactly is the problem here? Isn’t that what people want? Balanced coverage of the issue and both sides represented?
From what I understand the Chinese government’s film was a bit like having one’s head encased in stone and then being jackhammered out of it with an enormous communist cock. Hardly an effective crack at propaganda.
Update: Russell Brown watched both...
Timely Reminder Not To Trust Financial Statements...
Link
Someone in the office of NZ Farming Systems Uruguay Ltd left the phrase “fudge this” from an earlier draft in the company’s statements.
Hmmmm, I feel a photoshop assisted statement coming on.
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Rudman On P (not literally).
Brian Rudman throws his hat into the ring over the possibility of banning pseudoephedrine in cold pills and argues, as I did, that hitting the old flu pill won’t have much effect on the methamphetamine trade. By way of illustration have a look at this police operation from 2004 that nabbed around 240K pre-cursor capsules.
I didn’t read Paul Holmes’ open letter to the Prime...
Wellingtonians Won't Pay For Plastic Bags
As the story says Pak ‘n Save has been charging for plastic bags for years, so what exactly is the problem with shoppers in Welington? Awww, can’t bring bring your own bag to the supermarket? Poor things.
August 2009
105 posts
“In a long-awaited review of strategy, General Stanley McChrystal compares the...”
– http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/afghanistan/6117298/Coalition-strategy-in-Afghanistan-failing-admits-US.html
How then does this reflect on NZ’s decision to send SAS troops to Afghanistan?
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Secret London
photo of Raymond’s Revuebar as it exists today, via janeslondon.com
“Yasar, who knows that a community is nothing without shared memories, is currently involved in an oral history project that involves the recording of first-generation settlers. The first batch of tapes arrived the day we met, but they proved to be faulty: the lighting was poor, the voices inaudible.”
...
“But a select committee review of the scheme shows National, UnitedFuture and ACT...”
– Aye? What’s the point of that then? Link
Basic economics of solar energy
soupsoup:
osmium:
Soup posted a map this morning of the land area necessary to power the world with solar panels. If there were collectors on some small-looking percentage of the Earth’s land mass, it would be enough. Some researchers have calculated world roof-top area, and it’s close to the right number.
I was looking through the responses and noticed that someone reblogged and asked why...
