A process of recovery.

Having been in the building trade for most of my working life, I have had several experiences of being called in by a agitated home owner to redeem or recover a job gone bad after the sacking of the original building contractor. I’m not talking multi-storey here, just your average housing extension or renovation..There is a process to this recovery that is much the same as the approach to many like scenarios of, say.. failed health, failed business model, even or perhaps in this analogy most especially ; failed politics.

The first thing to do is to make an assessment on the customer who called you in..you have to ascertain if the failure is perhaps a fault of the client interfering too much in the structure or the materials quality..this can sometimes happen where a client tries to get the builder to stretch spans between structural supports to gain more open space, thereby weakening the support loads of trusses or beams..sometimes a customer will “have a mate in the game” when it comes to getting materials..and they could be structural timber with no or lower grade structural quality..things like that, where a good builder or tradesperson will pull the client up and refuse to do such things…but in the case of the dodgy builder, sometimes anything goes and the job becomes a nightmare of dodgy work, chaotic coordination of trades and a general trash-site of rubbish and bits and pieces…I’m sure many of you have seen such in your travels..in short; managerial failure.

Once you have satisfied yourself with the clients credibility, you close the site while you do a thorough stocktake of : status of work completed, structural quality of work done, in hand materials stocktake and site tidiness and access for bobcats and any trenching work first needed..you then get hold of your own reliable subbies and set to work drawing up schedules and timelines..and you are then on the road to recovery…some of these measures can involve sacrificing off-cut materials left around and while useful, only congest the site and make it dangerous for clear procedure and they have to go into the big, blue-bin..A small loss for the greater gain.

Australian politics is now at the “failed dodgy builder” stage…We have the LNP in govt’ which has to be the equivalent of the “Dodgy Bros’ Constructions” in every sense of word and deed..If they WERE in charge of building (which they are!) , if they WERE in charge of contracting out (which they are!), if they WERE in charge of organising, timetabling, costing and supplying for basic infrastructure (which they have been!), the nation would be the equivalent of your average basket-case building site chaos (which it is!) , where not only has the owner been trying to cut corners with materials, cut cost with dodgy contractors, but also giving the builders carte-blanch with the credit card which has been used to fleece the account to purchase holidays in the Cayman Islands, apartments on the Gold Coast and buy bling jewellery in Harrods Dep’t Store!….(Which they HAVE!).

The road to recovery would demand the above standard response..: First SACK the builder!, second : Remove costing and quality and structural control from the builder’s jurisdiction..and Third, set the building inspectors onto the builder and financier and seek legal redress!!

This mob of LNP ministers and govt’ would have to be the most corrupt and incompetent collection of useless good-for-nothings ever brought in to run any sort of project..There is not ONE area of expertise where you could point to and say that THERE is a competent minister doing a good job…NOT ONE!!..Not from the Prime Minister or his dept’ , neither Foreign Affairs, Treasury, Defence, communications, health, education, employment, environment…and the list goes on and on…not ONE competent minister, nor one moral or ethical standout in the entire government..and don’t give me those who pushed for the SSM vote..that was just a one off and they read the public mood..or else they would have buckled as they have done so many times before.

No..we now have a “rubbish builder” Government, who has made a hash of the job and needs to be sacked, removed and audited for charges to be brought against it. We have the equivalent of the builder who is unlicensed, unqualified and incompetent to do the job..Just like we had Att’ny Gen’ Brandis who hid his incompetence behind reams of legal jargon, Minister Hunt who sheltered under his deceit of environmental sympathy and Sen’ Cash who has charge of job skilling, but who has not done a honest days work in her life and then we come to the foreign minister who just isn’t and we must conclude with minister Pyne who always works best playing the “straight man” to his leader ; Turnbull’s buffoonery!

Writing as a tradesman witnessing such mind-numbing political stupidity when it comes to doing the job right, I have come to both disrespect and resent that class of person who, coming from tertiary education into politics as a lawyer, accountant, business manager or as some other vague qualification not in the least useful to the everyday world of the common citizenry, yet are seemingly chosen from their peers, holding high that slip of paper stating manner of tertiary degree or PhD. Doctorate or Managerial Certificate that appears to be enough to give them almost ecclesiastical status in the public eye..while we of the working classes had to stitch and slave and study our way to education via the late-night glow of the desk lamp after both a day’s hard physical work and getting the children to bed …and even then, when we DO obtain at least enough proficiency of language to make our tumbling thoughts plain and concise, we get picked up mockingly on our grammatical mistakes that are made to seem equal to a crime of capital proportions…when in reality…in REAL reality..those members of the Government ( and, sadly , some even of our own representative side of politics ) most praised by a sycophantic media and positioned cheerfully on our screens to lie and deceive at every opportunity, in truth they really wouldn’t know shit from clay….S-H-I-T from clay.

Time for the educated working class to take command and start the process of recovery of this nation…truly..sincerely!

I’ll give the last word (not that he deserves it, but because he says it best) to that old bluffer ; Malcolm Muggeridge…:

“So the final conclusion would surely be that whereas other civilizations have been brought down by attacks of barbarians from without, ours had the unique distinction of training its own destroyers at its own educational institutions, and then providing them with facilities for propagating their destructive ideology far and wide, all at the public expense. Thus did Western Man decide to abolish himself, creating his own boredom out of his own affluence, his own vulnerability out of his own strength, his own impotence out of his own erotomania, himself blowing the trumpet that brought the walls of his own city tumbling down, . . . Until at last, having educated himself into imbecility, and polluted and drugged himself into stupefaction, he keeled over–a weary, battered old brontosaurus–and became extinct.”

The Leopard is dead.

“If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change” says Tancredi , the young nephew of Fabrizio, the Sicilian Prince and central character of “The Leopard”..a very influential book by Giuseppe de Lampedusa.

Tancredi is an opportunist who understands what he needs to do to climb the social ladder in modern Italy. As he tells his uncle, the Prince: “If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change” . In other words, if the upper-class wants to keep living a rich lifestyle, they’ll need to adapt to the changing world. The story unfolds toward the ending of aristocratic rule in that part of the world in the time of the Risogimento in Italy as Garibaldi’s troops swoop into Sicily to complete the unification of that nation and marking the beginning of the end of many if not all aristocratic rule throughout Europe.

“Most of the novel is set during the time of the Risorgimento specifically during the period of history as Giuseppe Garibaldi, the hero of Italian unification, swept through Sicily with his forces, known as The Thousand. The plot focuses upon the aristocratic Salina family, which is headed by the stoic Prince Fabrizio, a consummate womanizer who foresees the upcoming downfall of his family and the nobility in Italy as a whole but finds himself unable to change the course of history.” (Wikipedia)

And indeed, history has recorded that change from aristocratic rule to Upper middle-class domination..one could rightfully call it a tyranny of banker’s economic slavery..that has grown from an ideology steeped in the almost hard-core blue-print of genetic greed stamped on some of the most flawed elements of human evolution..a class evolved from a malevolent hunger to have and have and have more than their fellow people for but one vicious end..to dominate through a system of ”reward / punishment” the political and economic powerhouses of the western world.

They have conquered…But they hold power by a thread..a pernicious contract..
The power of the upper middle-class resides in capital and only capital..it is a bluff of the most extraordinary reach, encompassing personal domestic finances of the home, local business exchange activity, states, territory and national treasury economic policy..each morning we wake to the financial reports and stock market fluctuations, as if they were the life-blood of our very existence..and with the control of money reaching so far into the personal well-being of our lives , perhaps they now are!…I see my children as young adults now..struggling with home ownership, credit debt for what my generation would see as trivialities (communications / entertainments holiday travel etc…), lured deeper and deeper into a world of easy credit exchange and banker’s spiel so that their now fragile employment opportunities are too valuable to risk with reckless protest against the very swindle of wages reductions and casualisation of job opportunity.

Consider carefully the subtle intrigue of the advice of Maecenas , one of those original constructors of this malignant middle-class power base..in his counsel to the new Emperor Augustus..:

“ “And do not, I beg you, be afraid of the magnitude of the empire. For the greater its extent, the more numerous are the salutary elements it possesses; also, to guard anything is far easier than to acquire it. Toils and dangers are needed to win over what belongs to others, but a little care suffices to retain what is already yours. Moreover, you need not be afraid, either, that you will not live quite safely in that office and enjoy all the blessings which men know, provided that you will consent to administer it as I shall advise you. And do not think that I am shifting the discussion from the subject in hand if I speak to you at considerable length about the office. For of course my purpose in doing this will be, not to hear myself talk, but that you may learn by a strict demonstration that it is both possible and easy, for a man of sense at least, to rule well and without danger.

“I maintain, therefore, that you ought first and foremost to choose and select with discrimination the entire senatorial body, inasmuch as some who have not been fit have, on account of our dissensions, become senators. Such of them as possess any excellence you ought to retain, but the rest you should erase from the roll. Do not, however, get rid of any good man because of his poverty, but even give him the money he requires. In the place of those who have been dropped introduce the noblest, the best, and the richest men obtainable, selecting them not only from Italy but also from the allies and the subject nations. In this way you will have many assistants for yourself and will have in safe keeping the leading men from all the provinces; thus the provinces, having no leaders of established repute, will not begin rebellions, and their prominent men will regard you with affection because they have been made sharers in your empire.” (Cassius Dio..: The Roman Histories..Maecenus’ advice to Augustus).

Such “advice” has been the hallmark of the process of selection of those sympathetic to the aspirations of that class of economic tyrants in seeking the “consciousness of kind” down through the ages…and if they cannot skim them from the lowest filth of society, they will “manufacture” them in the private schools and colleges of the nations, turning the heads of the young and gullible toward a world of promised riches, bling and cruelty..maintained by a servitude of henchmen hopelessly and futilely aspiring to become themselves, one of the “elite” order of absolute bastardry of the upper middle-classes.

We have but one cause to devote ourselves to if we wish to redeem this planet’s environment, this planet’s sustainability, this nation’s dignity and this people’s honour..and that is to remove the entrepreneurial / speculative middle-class from holding total power in our democracy. Their ideology of economic command has led them to use the monetary system, a system constructed initially for nothing more than convenience of exchange of goods and commodities for an accepted value in currency (gold or silver etc..) and by their greed of accumulation and political control along with the now domination of ability to appoint and direct officials of bureaucratic oversight of excess of power, they have totally corrupted that very democracy that has with tolerance, allowed them to wheedle, bribe and brutally take command of governance where they can. They have over-reached their acceptable influence.

With the many examples of financial chicanery being exposed NOT by the Oligarchic mogul controlled Main Stream Media, but by social media and courageous whistle-blowers, we now see just how far property and monetary possession has corrupted that class so that there is deliberate action to limit inquiry and investigation AND ability to collect taxation and remuneration to the State… There is an action in operation by some of these people that could equate to treason by the now members of the very senators and ministers that hold government..The wealthy are writing the laws that restrict inquiry into the habits of the wealthy…

“If we want things to stay as they are, things will have to change”…

If we want things to change, things CANNOT stay as they are. The upper middle-class has to be torn down from their positions of power before that power corrupts completely, our nation.

“No future for YOUUUUU!!…”

Stumbled across a You Tube clip from 2007 of The Sex Pistols playing their “Retirement Fund Tour” at Brixton to a rabid frenzied crowd of several thousands. The band pumped out this cacophony wall of sound that was both incomprehensible yet totally in-sync and in tune with the frenzied mob…a truly wonderous experience..They knew all the words…the pauses…the nous and the required volume of roaring that at times even drowned out the exaggerated magnification of Johnny Rotten’s microphone…Here, see it now with; “Anarchy in the UK”…

One has to say the raw energy pumped out at that concert is something to both behold and to be wary of. Sure..while the band may presume that the energised mass of people are fans, there is also the hint that here was an energy beyond the control of the band that could be captured by another demagogue more sinister than mere music…watch them perform “God Save the Queen”…

There is an energy and demand in that roaring mob that reaches beyond mere entertainment..there is the definite intent of political direction…a fierce and unbridled frustration that will one day have to be confronted and will confront our false sense of security..One could claim that politics has taken unintended control of the movement.

What has The Sex Pistols to do with local politics you could be asking about now…I say it has to do with control of public mood..who can create the frenzy.. who can bring it to their use and how is it kept under control. For while that particular band has created with their particular brand of words, mood and driving music the catalyst for the outpouring of energy, one has to admit that the public mood extrapolated SINCE Punk Music hit the scene has captured both the performers and the driving beat and pumped it up into a working-class anthem for disquiet and discontent way above the limits of that band and many others..the rhythm and the drum-beat has become the foot-falls of unrest that now permeates through the working classes of the west…the brutal countenance of their features have become our own “Faces in the street”….perhaps it is time for the radicalising of this public disquiet by the Left to be roused into white-hot anger and turned without mercy or sympathy upon the cowardly, cruel ruling classes of our nation.

I would suggest that what we are witnessing with the elections of many shit-for-brains political minnows throughout the western democracies, is not necessarily a backing of right-wing policies by the working-class, but a totally rebellious ; “IN – YOUR – FUCKING – FACE !!” statement that wants to shove it right up the clackers of those managerial middle-class political parties that in the end do so effing little for the working-class, they might just as well not exist!…So in voting in those gormless delinquents like Trump, The LNP . , The Tories, PHON, and a host of sabotaging, destructive bastards, we are breaking up what could be seen as a political system heavily weighted to serve the 1%, by turning the most destructive elements of managerial middle-class against itself!..So it might as well be ALL destroyed as to be left in place to rot and demean the living standards of the poor and vulnerable.

What evidence for such cynicism?..you cry!…

Well..here in Oz..you look at these last two by-elections held in what could be called “well to do” seats…In the first we saw Barnaby Joyce, not even trying to attend any public forums or questions from the public..because as was EVENTUALLY revealed, he had been acting and was evidently accused by his own daughter through a loud-hailer from HIS OWN promotions car of sexual improprieties more suitable to a drunken, front-bar lothario than a high minister in the Federal govt’. He disgraced both expected community standards, family trust and common decency while acting and then seeking to represent that very electorate whose moral and ethical principles would normally come down like a ton of bricks on such disgraceful behaviour…if..those voters of that more affluent regional centre maintained any sense of moral propriety and decency to throw the bum out of his seat..But they didn’t…and in doing so demonstrated to the rest of the nation that community morals and ethics can be trod underfoot for political expediency. And we have to question most severely the MSM whose moral integrity would evade those most obvious indecencies by the sitting member, yet would brazenly plaster in a mocking slander over that entire front page of one of its shit-sheets, the theatrical face of an actor accused on the most flimsy of grounds and most vacuous of evidence of a moral impropriety…the hypocrisy is breath-taking!

Likewise in the just completed Bennelong by-election, where that reasonably affluent electorate cast aside any concern for the greater benefit of the nation and returned an obvious useless time-server and so restored the confidence and parliamentary numbers to a totally corrupt government that will continue to pursue the poor, vilify the desperate and broken and continue to betray the state..What can you expect from the vast majority who can see this happening under their nose and as a snub to their worries and cares…all formulated and delivered by a MSM who would hold the secrets of Barnaby’s degeneracies, and promote by averting its investigative eyes from those water policies that now demand a Royal Commission into the very region that is under Barnaby’s braggadocio bias’s…A MSM that avoids all the difficult and shady areas of questioning of the “born to rule” side of politics and then creates perfidious imagery to slander and debase the progressive side of politics, all for the benefit of that tax evasive 1%.

Whichever way you want to read it, the economically better-placed middle-class has right-royally screwed over the working classes…and will continue to do it as long as we have this top-heavy management system that both refuses to expose the criminal element in our political system and an electorate that continues to vote in those members most efficacious to their requirements. There is now a divide so obvious that it could seem that the only way of breaking the impasse is to use the democratic system..now corrupted by the middle-class and its creatures in media and politics..to bring down and destroy to the very foundations that tottering façade of lies and deceit that tries to pass itself off as “good governance”..FUCK THEM ALLLLLL !!!

Consider the famous “speech” made by Calgacus to his troops before battle with the Romans.:
“Whenever I consider the origin of this war and the necessities of our position, I have a sure confidence that this day, and this union of yours, will be the beginning of freedom to the whole of Britain. To all of us slavery is a thing unknown; there are no lands beyond us, and even the sea is not safe, menaced as we are by a Roman fleet. And thus in war and battle, in which the brave find glory, even the coward will find safety. Former contests, in which, with varying fortune, the Romans were resisted, still left in us a last hope of succour, inasmuch as being the most renowned nation of Britain, dwelling in the very heart of the country, and out of sight of the shores of the conquered, we could keep even our eyes unpolluted by the contagion of slavery. To us who dwell on the uttermost confines of the earth and of freedom, this remote sanctuary of Britain’s glory has up to this time been a defence. Now, however, the furthest limits of Britain are thrown open, and the unknown always passes for the marvellous. But there are no tribes beyond us, nothing indeed but waves and rocks, and the yet more terrible Romans, from whose oppression escape is vainly sought by obedience and submission. Robbers of the world, having by their universal plunder exhausted the land, they rifle the deep. If the enemy be rich, they are rapacious; if he be poor, they lust for dominion; neither the east nor the west has been able to satisfy them. Alone among men they covet with equal eagerness poverty and riches. To robbery, slaughter, plunder, they give the lying name of; Government.. they make a solitude and call it peace (ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant)…”
Tacitus: Calgacus’ Speech to his Troops (A.D. 85)

NO FUTURE..NO FUTURE FOR YOUUUUUUU….!

Too late for heroes.

You remember Anzac Day ? That national day of respect will before long be upon us once more, a week or so after Easter. And taking nothing from the sad disaster of the deaths of the many young men and woman who gave their lives in some of those Imperialistic adventures, one does have to reflect on that one day when it seems that those from that class of people who have given or suffered the least in most wars are there ; Front and Centre demanding the nation looks to their example for “courage and determination” in leadership..sad indeed is that truth that those who are the least inclined to courageous in their civic life are the ones who demand the most sacrifice from our defence personnel of the nation…and yet, when called upon to make reparation to the damage done by the most egregious political party ; The LNP to every vulnerable demographic; ethnic, impoverished and /or disabled, AND the betrayal of essential infrastructure, the voting public has once again failed in even its most easy test…and still we go looking for heroes.

So even though/or when Anzac Day will once again be upon us, can one legitimately observe :

There is really no point anymore in respecting Anzac Day…no respect also in the sad silence of Remembrance Day, not long gone…no longer such “emergency” in the warning of “genetic cleansing” or other Semitic massacres in the Arabian Peninsula; “Never let this happen again!” once the cry….for even here, in our own country…a country of the “fair go”…the “easy-going Aussie”..the “land that is for everyone”…it is gone. How many people in Aust and the world marched against the Iraq war, against continued refugee detention?…one..two ..a million?…yet the Iraq war was delivered with the now commonly recognisable “Howard-shit-eater grin”, standing next to his neo-con USofA. mate ; D. Rumsfeld as they promised and delivered “shock and awe”…which destroyed an entire nation and stole the breath of at least a million citizens of that nation…and created the continuity of the exodus of those same refugees that we react against today. Where a scalpel-cut execution of the so-called “reviled leader” could have been done as has been done (under the very noses of security) of several since. No, this war was another anti-Semite war, for the majority of Iraqis are Arab…this was another religious “crusade”…too late the cry of “never again!”, ..it has already been done..thanks to the war-mongering Right-wing of Australian politics!

That amorphous collection of provocateurs and saboteurs that calls itself The IPA., sloping about in the umbra of political activity, always the “bag-man” for LNP political short-bets, it’s sickly-smiling members parachuted into the Senate like one of “The Phantom Turd Flinger” of Preston’s brown paper-bags of shit dropping on the heads of the bogans in his local pub car-park.. (https://freefall852.wordpress.com/2016/12/14/the-phantom-turd-flinger-of-preston/ ), we have this organisation that acts as a “finishing school” for the clumsy, gormless, naïve, self-centred arse-holes that is de-rigeur for any LNP wannabe member of The House…and we have to consider; such Machiavellian deviousness and sly-eyed bastardry could not possibly be a product of a natural development of the child..The cruelty, the attraction toward the betrayal and selling-out of one’s nation is a thing not best left to chance…hence the thorough indoctrination by those expensive private schools and colleges to “enhance” and “guide” through devoted mentors, to enhance that “consciousness of kind” or whatever “natural bastardry” existed in the gentle mind of the children..One would not like to think such acts of pusillanimous self-centred, spiteful, shit-headidness was just a normality of those many “cats” from that demographic.

And Anzac Day?…That day of sombre celebration of unity against adversity…courage against onslaught…camaraderie as mateship and unity as strength. It is a mockery of those who faced and endured such trials and tribulations, when we have abandoned even the pretence of such in our everyday lives…the disbanding and dismantling, with the voted-in permission of the Aust’ electorate, of all those community services and policies that WERE for the benefit of the MAJORITY of citizens lends a mockery to those that ran, bent-backed, across the deadly sands of Gallipoli….we mock their memory as the “everyman-Australian”, while we mock universal social reform and the “fair go” for everybody in a poverty-enriched exchange for the self-centred individual.

And Remembrance Day?..for all those who went to a war zone, whatever their individual reason, that suffered and died for what they believed was right and for the common good…for freedom and fraternity. By giving one minute’s silence for their sacrifice , while the IPA / LNP clamour and holler endlessly for THEIR “rights and demands” as an individual to plunder and rob and connive and abuse our fellow citizens…..THAT has to be the saddest mockery of all…..a minutes silence for that multitude of lost youth and lives of the brave and courageous, while the IPA / LNP enjoy seemingly limitless selfishness and endless “sunshine”.

It is a mockery and a travesty of civil-society, that the IPA / LNP. has declared itself the arbiters, through the most minority of winning margins, to dictate a diminished capacity for the citizens of THIS..OUR country to live a respected and respectable life. The shrill accusations of this govt’ and its lobby groups does crude mockery to our fallen, our revered memories, our honourable intentions and our international good name.

It will be left to us to maintain the rage…let us hope we will be permitted the capacity!…..because, by Christ!…the nation and the citizen body WILL demand the satisfaction!

Taking down the calendars.

The taking down of the calendars & Ziedel’s secret Carby’.

Dropped in to the workshop to pay my mechanic’s bill a while back..more than a year or so, in fact..anyway, it was on that day when Peter..the mechanic..was taking down several of those “girlie” calendars that are almost a fixture on the office walls of such tradie shops like Peter’s garage.

I like those old style mechanics garages..you know, those ones with an old busted engine block or gearbox covered in old oil and rags by the big doors..the loose chain block and tackle hanging from a cross-beam in the rafters..and the racks of stored bits and pieces of “will be useful one day” stuff against the wall..the welding gear, the drill-press and perhaps a metal lathe for turning down that impossible to find part but this one will be alright with a bit of tweaking…and the peg-board with the shadow marks of all the spanners that go just there..and still with the old “pit” in the floor.

It reminds me of the days of steam locomotives when I was a kid. I would like to walk close to the edge of the platform next to the huffing/puffing locomotive just to get a whiff of that rush of steam from the front wheel pistons…that moist steam that had that slight scent of lubricating oils..whoosh!..lovely memories…Christ ..they’ve taken all the fun out of a young boy’s life with the beigeing of things.

Which brings me back to old Peter taking down those calendars.

I stopped in the doorway of the garage office..a small cluttered room off the back corner of the workshop..Peter had his back to me as he examined one large poster of an attractive young woman clad erotically and holding a pneumatic implement…the poster was an advertisement for a well-known tool company.

I looked to the wall where this calendar, along with several others had hung for many years. The wall was now cleared.

“Hello, Peter..you doing a spring cleanout?”

“Wha!..oh..hello young fellah…no.. no..” and he seemed to reflect for a moment..” I’m just moving with the times.” And he rolled the calendar he had in front of him up..” Goodbye ‘Sadira’…” (the poster had scripted under the pinup ; “Sadira always uses a S….”and the brand name of the company).

“So what are the new ones?” I asked..”A Pirelli calendar?”

Peter sighed wistfully…

“No..no new ones..or at least none with women on them…perhaps one from the grocery store..with pictures of kittens or flowers or something..no more females…But I will miss ‘Sadira’…god..she was beautiful..as Vern would say ; more curves than a box full of Sidchromes!”

I offered to pay my account and he slumped wearily into the swivel chair behind his desk. He pulled out the ledger and flipped the pages open with the red ribbon. He sat silently staring at the empty wall..and he sighed and leaned back…a tad misty-eyed.

“ I never got married, you know..nearly!..but not quite..That first one fair took my heart..threw me for a while when she left and then I guess I never really got back the momentum to get serious with another girl until I suddenly woke one day and realised I was so much older..and I no longer had the hunger…or felt the need for marriage..here..what’s the damage on that docket?”

I paid the account and Peter rose and followed me out into the cool, darkened workshop..the brilliant Mallee sunlight outside razor-sharp in contrast. Peter and I gazed into the empty floor space.

“ But times change…’cause you see, back in the early days, the only people used to come in here were the farmers with their tractors or the other blokes in the district..rarely a woman, and then only grudgingly as the place has that smell of dirt and grease and oil…so it was just par for the course to get those calendars from the travelers and such..and I’d put them up on the wall there..one on top of the other as the years go by..just par for the course..But now women do so much more of their own business..arrange the repairs, discuss the mechanical problems, pay the bills..AND argue the toss on the cost of repairs!..and it don’t look good to have those calendars there any more..and besides, many of the companies themselves have stopped making those sort of calendars…they know as well…times change.”

I didn’t have much to add to his musings..so I just grunted a kind of affirmation..and he started to walk away…then he stopped and continued..

“… an’ I suppose a fellah gets too old to have such things on his wall…wouldn’t want it to get about that I was a dirty old man..women don’t like that sort of thing…but by jingo..I’m gonna miss that “Sadira”…just the sight of those lovely blue eyes at the start of the day was enough to kick me along..but hey, that picture is so old..I shouldn’t wonder if she isn’t a grandmother herself now!..ah…women..beautiful creatures…( and he shook his head)..more curves than a box full of Sidchromes…”

And he went over to fix a flat tyre.
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Ziedel’s secret carby’.

Was asking for a bit of background knowledge on a long deceased relative of mine from the local aged mechanic…Peter Pholl…He and his offsider ; Vern, run the only workshop in the district..have done for near on fifty or sixty years!…I don’t know…neither does anyone else…not even them!

“Name doesn’t ring any bells..” Peter frowned

“He was a very inventive sort of chap..in the line of mechanical things” ..I assisted.

“Ooo, there were a lot of them about in them days” Peter opined “A lot of them…There was Pastor Ziedel, for instance…Why..HE was a sort of genius…Do you know, he invented a carburetor that could halve petrol consumption in a motor..but the thing was, he was dammed clever how he done it.” and here Peter tapped the side of his nose.

“How so?” I asked.

“Well, you know he didn’t want anybody to find out how he done it, so he got those little jets and needles and seats and whatnot made in different places by different chaps so no-one person could put them all together…Ooo..he was cunning alright”

“So did you get to see how it looked?” I pushed on. Peter stopped, pulled up and looked at me in wide-eyed wonder.

“No!..of course not, it was a secret!…hell, he wouldn’t let anyone see how he done it…why, if he went to any motor event, he’d take that carburetor off and put the old one on so nobody could pinch his design..Ooo, he was cunning , ; old Pastor Ziedel.”

“But if no one saw it, how do you know it worked?”

There was a pause in the response, which told me that this cynical line of reasoning had never before been broached…then ;…

“Whhyy…of course it worked…you ask anybody who knew of it…he had it on his old Holden for years…of course it worked…and dammed good too!”

“Well, I imagine some one saw it after he passed away…was it in his estate when they went through his effects?”

“No..not that I ever heard..I suppose his son threw it out with a lot of other stuff.”

“What!” I exclaimed “I would have thought it would be a very valuable item.”

“Maybe…but because the old man was so secretive about it, I don’t suppose the sons would have know what it was if’n they came across it.”

And THAT is the wonderful way local history is created!

The Law.

With the hounding down of Sam Dastyari today, we saw the reality of a new political low in Australian culture. We witnessed for the first time in our political history the Main Stream Media take control of political agenda and with the least assistance possible from the political opponents of the ALP, hunt down and destroy a member of the Senate of the Democratic state of Australia.

This throws a new light on the MSM and who’s interests it is serving..in particular concerning the National Broadcaster, which is supposed to run neutral on political issues..yet we witnessed time and again a unilateral position taken on the cause of the Dastyari affair. While scant mention of the members of the Government receiving and even inviting donations of sometimes much greater figures from the very same source.

There was a “game” played in the south of Italy back before the second world war called : “The Law”..It was a very vicious game played for high stakes among both the very wealthy and the very poor..:

“The grotesque game of the Law, played in the taverns of southern Italy, is but a shadow of an even fiercer attitude to life-a potent metaphor for a vigorously hierarchical view of existence which rules over the mezzogiorno, the noonday culture of southern Italy. These are an almost feudal system of landownership which confers a bizarre set of rights upon a small number of landowners, and a pervasive system of organised crime which at one level seeks to control everything which occurs in the village and exact a tax on every transaction, and at another level manifests as petty crime and pickpocketing. These combine with a hierarchical social system and a set of values based on traditional ideas such as honour, and which establish norms which determine who in this society is beholden to whom.” (From a review of the book ; “The Law” by Roger Vailland )

The attraction of the game was the possibility of the peasant having a moment of control over his landlord or some other local official. It was a cruel game that became so notorious in its demands that it was finally banned by Benito Mussolini…That in itself shows the depth of viciousness it could descend to. The accusation and the hunting down of Sam Dastyari equals in viciousness that game..
There is a new direction now played out in this game of politics..The National Broadcaster has dealt into the hand..a position once reserved for the Murdoch press, but that monster, having lost both credibility and readership, it would seem that those who know how to organise these things have commanded that the ABC take over the shift once reserved for the Murdoch hacks. Perhaps because it is seen as having more “media cred”, more media “impact on the appropriate audience” than those has-beens in the commercial media…and I see that a new generation of suave, celebrity “media lounge-lizards” has pasted themselves on our ABC screen. A generation given the taste of “celeb’-bling” that will adhere them to the Murdoch stooge’s arse like a persistent pile.

“ The law referenced by the title has nothing to do with civil authority or the official laws of the region. There seems little concept in the society being described of a moral requirement to heed the laws of the land; such laws are viewed as requirements which have been imposed, and which can therefore be evaded. The very people charged with upholding the law, such as the chief of police and his deputies, are those involved in developing strategies for its evasion. They happily invent stories, fabricate evidence, and block investigations, in this case to assist the principal racketeer Matteo Brigante in his efforts to evade justice. He is a man proud of his hobby of raping virgins, and this is known by Chief of Police Atillo, whose own favourite pastime is seducing the wives of the town’s leading citizens, making use of the racketeer’s premises for his conquests. The two men often compare and contrast their respective pleasures and approaches, each quietly confident that he is the more virile.” (ibid)

Another worrying concept witnessed in the loss of Dasty’, that cheerful jester of the House doorstop interview..is the lack of backing from his own team. Oh yes, there was the usual denials, the usual “downcast eyes” and twisting of the shoe in the soft dirt..the usual ; “Oh well, I’m sure he will think on his actions and . . .” but where was the blood ‘n’ guts of the counter punch when this all started to get a re-run ?..I’m not saying there was complicit evasion of any defence, but by jingo!..it sure looked to me to be a tad wishy washy…a mite; pissy-weaky..sure..we can say that Dasty’ had done his dash by his very actions..that he, himself had cruelled his chances..But in the end , all he did was to drive through on the Keating philosophy of ; “Look to Asia first” policy..and in doing so would he not deserve a little bit more consideration from his mates in the car pool?…I want to see at the next election a victory earned by blood, sweat and tears..That’s why we write here on these blogs..I don’t want to see a stroll across the line through a default gain from hoping the other side falls down mid race..waiting for the sprained “political knee”, or the political crook back..I want to FEEL the tactile bone of victory..I want to SEE the pain of loss in the eyes of those miserable, cruel bastards when they concede they were beaten by the better team…DAMMIT!..I want to see a new Australia rise from the fecund manure that this government is of lowly bottom-feeders, these moist microbes of most vile excretions from the soiled arse of some strange, alien parasitical maggot.

WE want a victory worthy of the name of the battle..and we want to go into that battle knowing that Labor has our back. I do NOT want our political intentions and honesty gambled away like chips in a high-risk game..I do not wish to witness all those hours of effort we put in here supporting an ideology worthy of benefit to so many being used as a kind of stuffing for some toy or ourselves as cannon fodder in a political war between party factions or old school tie wrangling.

I will NOT be dragged by my ideological enthusiasm as an unwilling player in a game of tyranny!

“ It is a game of six or more players, played as a series of rounds, and in each round chance, in the form of dice or a drawn tarot card, determines which player will be the chief. He will choose another player as his deputy, and the others will supply a carafe of wine; the round ends when the carafe is drained. The chief behaves however he pleases: he may share the wine with the others or withhold it, and he may interrogate, slander, blame or praise them; his will is the law. A common strategy is to find the most vulnerable player and to humiliate him publicly, by referring to past indiscretions or current rumours, or by proposing some violation of a member of his family; he is required to endure it without flinching. It is the imposition of will which is appealing, the prospect of inflicting or observing the humiliation of another which affords them pleasure, and the possibility of demeaning someone higher in the hierarchy and untouchable in normal life which induces them to play.

But the law refers to more than this. It is a set of ideas and traditions embedded deep within the culture, which codifies obligations. It is a set of norms used to govern behaviour, but more importantly, it also establishes the benchmarks against which the behaviour of others can be judged. It is made clear that every one in the south of Italy is a jurist, ready to judge the others for their adherence to these unwritten rules and to impose them collectively through marshalling of town opinion, and it can encompass everything from the duty of a wife to submit to her husband’s desires, to the unquestioned right of a landowner to take the virginity of every young woman in his household, irrespective of her own wishes. It is assisted by the claustrophobic nature of southern Italian life in which every action is observed and reported, and everyone concerns themselves with knowing the business of everyone else.” (ibid)

We are now seeing the rise of a like culture in Australian politics, where the dice having been cast, the players ; MSM (incl’ the ABC), LNP. Political opportunists, Corporations and Lobbyists set to and humiliate, belittle and torment the public….then go on to and rape and despoil the resources and the economy, to grant favours and loyalty to whomsoever they wish. This cannot continue.

As the unions are now saying..: “It is time to change the rules”.

Knight to King4…check..but not mate.

Is it easier for a corrupt government to poison a State, or for a corrupt people to poison good governance?

This question has to be considered in the light of the situation Australia now finds itself, where with a people so divided it is becoming difficult to tell if Parliamentary Politics is running the people or the mob-opinion is running the Parliamentary Politics.

With the introduction of many international “celebrity provocateurs” from the right-wing side of politics finding their way to this country on the invitation of lobby-groups and /or NGO’s and even some politicians themselves, it is becoming more difficult to tell where the dog ends and the wagging tail begins.

Now, we have a leadership that seems incapable of making an independent decision and is so obviously behoved to the mood swings of its donors and propagandists, it would seem that the “Ship of State” is rudderless and without power of its own. That old “scribe in the garret” ; Machiavelli, had definite opinions on how to assess and run a state..so let us consider his sage advice, for though it has to be said that the future cannot be predicted by simply turning of the pages of recorded historical example, we can read that the behaviours and habits of a people can be judged as predictable, if given situations and circumstances are similar.

“He who wants to alter a Republic ought to Consider its Condition
For a man can well by his methods and evil ways begin to corrupt the people of a City, but it is impossible that the life of one is [long] enough to corrupt them so that they, through it, can enjoy its fruit; and even if it were possible by the length of time that he should do so, it would be impossible from the manner in which men proceed, who, being impatient, cannot delay a passion of theirs for a long time, so that they deceive themselves in their own affairs, and especially in those which they desire very much. So that either from little patience, or from deceiving themselves, they attempt an enterprise at the wrong time, and would end badly.”

Here we see a pretty close definition of the last three LNP leaders..Abbott, Turnbull and Morrison..as a matter of fact, it would describe most accurately the uniform political trait of most right-wing politicians in the West…but let us continue..;

“To want to assume authority in a Republic, and install there a bad form of a Government, therefore, there is need to find the people corrupted by the times and that, little by little, from generation to generation, it is led to this corruption; these are led by necessity to this, unless they are (as has been discussed above) reinvigorated frequently by good examples or brought back by good laws to their principles.”

From the “end-time” of Menzies, in the late fifties/early sixties, Australia has suffered a chipping away of the easy-going lifestyle of many workers…and the beginnings of a division of labour and ethnicity in the population which instead of being conciliated, was played upon by opportunist parties and used as political fodder by many.

John Howard has to be considered the penultimate political opportunist of the divide and rule old-ward politician..His corralling and branding of this or that ethnic group , from demonising the original inhabitants of this country to impounding and imprisoning the latest refugees who sought protection under our flag, has set the standard that the right-wing elements in the people were proud to walk past and voted him in again and again.

Now, with the diametric trio ofMorrison / Turnbull / Abbott inseparable in policy and intention by even such a line through their party room, we are witnessing the near climax of that push of intention that will deliver this once fair nation to the brink of destruction both physical and psychological. Such governance has many times driven once healthy nations into the mire and swamp of lost hope with their deceitful promises and dreadful intentions..For the time is now at hand where, having driven such a wedge of hate into the soul of our nation, the right-wing side of politics will have to go that one step further to secure and increase power so as to push their agenda of total control to the next phase..and there are those in the party who have studied history enough to know that to falter now and secede power to the Left is to lose all they have fought for..So let us not delude ourselves..the phoney war is over..the real war has just begun..

Again with the Machiavelli…

“No one will ever say that Hannibal was not a master of war; and if, when he was at the encounter with Scipio in Africa, he should have seen advantage in prolonging the war, he would have done so: and for the future (he being a good Captain and having a good army) he would have been able to do as Fabius [ Roman military commander and statesman whose cautious delaying tactics (whence the nickname “Cunctator,” meaning “delayer,” which was not his official cognomen) during the early stages of the Second Punic War (218–201 bce) gave Rome time to recover its strength.] did in Italy, but not having done so, it ought to be believed that some important reason had persuaded him. For a Prince who has an army put together, and sees that from a want of money or of friends he cannot maintain such an army for any length of time, is completely mad if he does not try the fortune [of battle] before such an army would be dissolved, because by waiting he loses for certain, but by trying he may be able to win. There is something else to be esteemed greatly, which is, that in losing one ought also to want to acquire glory: and there is more glory in being overcome by force, than by some other evil which causes you to lose.”

Morrison and his right-wing colleagues, if and when they turn to confront and fight, will do so NOT as the action of a courageous cohort, but rather as the final action of a cornered feral animal..all claws and vicious spitting of them and their hacks in the MSM.

If there is one thing obvious in our geographic and geopolitical region now, it is the jockeying for position and allies between the two major powers in the western Asia-pacific rim. On the one hand we have the neighbouring reality of Asia and its peoples and on the other we have the “distant relative” and their familiarity of culture and politics. But we now have to ask ourselves if the peoples of a multi-cultural Australia as a whole are so ethnically aligned with the USA as we once were..or are we more inclined to reach over the fence and talk to our neighbours?

For many years, we have been politically, militarily and culturally aligned with the USA..but since the end of the Vietnam War, America has been more inclined to treat us as a chattel than as an ally..and our LNP leaders have been more than willing to commit money and military to many reckless adventures by the crazy right-wing side of American politics..so that now, rather than encouragement through open friendship, we get more of the sound of “you better or else” and the relationship has become more one of bribe, threat, fear and intimidation. Such an approach to a relationship can have unintended consequences on a relationship.

Keating noted well that our future vision should be turned toward Asia..an inevitability..instead, we now have leadership that seems intent to “demonise on demand” those very neighbours that we will eventually have to rely upon for trade and living standards..and whose friendliness will grant us long-term security in a climate changing world, where many fences between peoples and ethnicities will have to be torn down for mutual benefit rather than fortified from fear and distrust.
The nation needs consistency in these times of chaos…We are not getting it with this government. Let us finish with the wily but astute Machiavelli..

“ Nothing is more vain and more inconstant than the multitude, so our T. Livius and all other Historians affirm. For it often occurs in narrating the actions of men to observe the multitude to have condemned some one to death, and that same [multitude] afterwards weeping and very much wishing him back; as is seen the Roman people did in the case of Manlius Capitolinus, who, having condemned him to death, afterwards most earnestly desired him back. And the words of the author are these: As soon as they knew there was no peril from, they desired to have him back. And elsewhere, where he tells of the incidents which arose in Syracuse after the death of Hieronymus, nephew of Hiero, says: It is the nature of multitude, either to serve humbly, or to dominate haughtily. I do not know, in wanting to defend a thing which (as I have said) is accused by all writers, if I were to undertake a cause so hard and full of difficulty, that I would have either to abandon it in shame, or to go on with it burdensomely. But however it may be, I do not judge, or will ever judge, it to be a defect to defend any opinion with arguments, without wanting to employ either authority or force.

I say, therefore, the individual men, and especially Princes, can be accused of that defect which the writers accuse the multitudes; for anyone who is not controlled by the laws, will make the same errors as a loose multitude. And this can be easily observed, for there are and there have been many Princes, but of the good and wise ones there have been only a few, I say, of those Princes who have been able to break that restraint which could control them; among whom are not those Kings who arose in Egypt in that ancient period when that province was governed by laws, nor those who arose in Sparta, nor those who have risen in France in our times, which Kingdom is more regulated by laws than any other Kingdom of our times of which there is knowledge.”