July 19, 2004
MEETINGS PLANNED
The Left’s mania for organisation is its most charming quality. No idea, no matter how inconsequential, is allowed to evolve without meetings and committees and campaigns and branches and development. And active involvement at a grass roots level:
I've been doing some work on developing the liarsforhoward website, which is up (but still needs some work) and getting other people interested - organising a campaign committee etc.
What I envisage is that this should be a grass-roots media type campaign - the idea of which is to remind people that this is the most deceptive and unaccountable government in our history. We can turn up at events staged by the Liberals (or Labor for that matter), where we will have banners and chants such as 'rich schools need more pools', 'Invading Iraq DID NOT increase our terrorist threat!' etc. Our central message is that we support the Howard Government's right to lie to the Australian people - after all, they know what is best for us! It's in the good old Aussie tradition of taking the piss.
The thing about the campaign is that it will be open to anyone to join and create their own branch. The message is that if you're a Greenie in Hobart, Labor in Launceston, a Democrat in Darwin, or unaligned in Adelaide and you too have had enough of the lies and lack of accountability of this government, the "Liars for Howard" campaign and website will enable you to start up your own branch.
The site will eventually have downloadable material and I envisage that we will be able to provide some centralised support for others to tip them off to where Liberal and Labor events are going to be staged. So, I'm hoping in the next few months, this thing will grow in an organic type of way and in the next week or so we intend to hold our campaign launch (perhaps a mock protest at Michael Moore's new film Fahrenheit 9/11. I can see the banner now... "No Moore Truth!")
What would be most valuable to me as organiser of this thing is to have someone in the media who could tip us off to where the Liberals and Labor will be holding events on any particular day. Failing that, how can we find out this information?
By asking the Liberal/Labor Events Alert Committee, of course. I believe they’re associated with a sub-set of the Branch Co-ordination Campaign (National), which is currently locked in factional disputes with the Delusions of Influence Strategy Council and the Nationwide Collective of Organisational Organs.
Posted by Tim Blair at July 19, 2004 05:43 AMGawd...it's the same in Australia as in the US. Why don't the lefties just get a copyright on "Liars" and be done with it.
Posted by: Wallace-Midland, Texas at July 19, 2004 at 06:05 AMSo, I'm hoping in the next few months, this thing will grow in an organic type of way and in the next week or so we intend to hold our campaign launch (perhaps a mock protest at Michael Moore's new film Fahrenheit 9/11. I can see the banner now... "No Moore Truth!")
Given the terminal stupidity that has been observed in people who attend F/911 in "activist" roles (e.g. to canvass against Bush or to protest Iraq), I wouldn't be shocked to see this guy's group attacked by other leftists who don't get the sarcasm. Now wouldn't that be droll.
Posted by: PW at July 19, 2004 at 06:35 AMOh, and I think the Left's infatuation with committees and such is because they're big on making plans and small on following through. Just get yourself mired in twenty levels of subcommittees and you'll never have to worry about the follow-through part.
Posted by: PW at July 19, 2004 at 06:37 AMWe're the People's Front of Judea! Fucking Judean People's Front. Splitters!
Posted by: Brian O'Connell at July 19, 2004 at 06:39 AMJust reading that, I thought "How boring it all sounds." Don't these people have something better to do, like stay home and watch TV talk shows?
And what does "taking the piss" actually mean?
Posted by: Dr Alice at July 19, 2004 at 07:33 AMIt means all Aussies are into water sports.
Surfing! What did you think I meant?
Posted by: Brian O'Connell at July 19, 2004 at 09:06 AMFor crying out loud. They really ARE lost in the '60s.
Posted by: Spiny Norman at July 19, 2004 at 09:09 AMDr. Alice,
What does taking the piss actually mean?
Taking the piss = sending up, parodying, satirising, one of our more charming Aussie euphemisms.
Posted by: TimT at July 19, 2004 at 10:49 AMwhy exactly if the Howard government "the least accountable in Australian history". Has parliament been closed down and the constitution torn up since I moved ovrseas?
Posted by: mike a. at July 19, 2004 at 10:51 AMTaking the piss = sending up, parodying, satirising ...
As against:
'on the piss' or 'getting pissed' - drinking heavily;
'pissed off' - (a) very annoyed or (b) ran away;
'pisser' - something highly amusing
'pissing down' - raining rather heavily (not heard for some years in Australia).
I'm sure there are more. Australian English, easy innit?
Posted by: ilibcc at July 19, 2004 at 12:29 PMThe "Liars for Howard" website misspells "Margo Kingston" as "Margot Kingston". And the original page linked above has disappeared, suggesting that Herald website maintainers are avid readers of this blog.
Posted by: EvilPundit at July 19, 2004 at 12:35 PMSorry, I was mistaken when I said the original page had disappeared, above. It must have been a problem with my browser.
Posted by: EvilPundit at July 19, 2004 at 01:48 PMTim, any chance of a quick primer on the different Aussie political parties and how they lie in the political spectrum.
It would also help if you matched up the newspaper (and perhaps columnist) most closely aligned with that party.
(Signed) The Ignorant American
Posted by: Kevin at July 19, 2004 at 02:34 PMThanks. Haven't had so much fun since I helped organize the Anarchist Precision Drill Team back in the '60s to get some uni money. (Got it, too.) Up the committee!
Posted by: JorgXMcKie at July 19, 2004 at 04:31 PM"Banners and chants?"
PULEEZ!
No one is going to take this Movement seriously unless we get naked skanks on the ground spelling out "LUV" and "PACE!"
I demand an immediate vote by the delegates or WE ARE WANKING!
Uhh...I mean...WE ARE WALKING!
Do you not care that Howard keeps lying and getting away with it? As conservatives, do you not care that he does not respect the Westminster system at all? That neither he nor Bush care about the rule of law, and artificially try to avoid it - such as by holding people arguably outside the courts' jurisdiction?
Posted by: Jeremy at July 19, 2004 at 05:02 PMIt's because most of these lefties are public servants in their spare time and the only way they know how to handle a matter is to set up a committee. Then they appoint a chair(person), secretary and treasurer; have an agenda(that begins: minutes, business arising out of the miutes, correspondence received, etc); keep minutes; dispute the minutes; renegotiate the minutes; call for motions; pass resolutions;and set up subcommittees, working groups and task forces. And then there has to be a national committee, a committee for liasing with other States'committees, a national steering committee.......... This is how the Labour Party kills initiative ans promotes mediocrity.
Posted by: mr. magoo at July 19, 2004 at 05:05 PMDo you not care that Howard keeps lying and getting away with it? As conservatives, do you not care that he does not respect the Westminster system at all? That neither he nor Bush care about the rule of law, and artificially try to avoid it - such as by holding people arguably outside the courts' jurisdiction?
Do you not care that you have peddled a whole lot of lies yourself in that statement, and cleverly jammed every leftist meme into one paragraph?
Posted by: Quentin George at July 19, 2004 at 05:26 PMFurther to Mr Magoo's insights.
I have become involved in a neighbouhood center dominated by Labor do gooding types.
It has become exclusive(our target group)that have in the time I have been associated with it have;
Appointed a pedophile as weekend's away adult supervisor
Appointed a filmaker who filmed young girls without accountability
Run programmes for one supervisor who supervises one teacher that have one participant (at most) yet pulls $60,000 in funding per year
Provides housing to a drug dealer ,where children who are supposed to attend after school care end up going to instead.Yet the welfare worker defends the dealer and partner.
Taught local kids how to do appropriate graffiti and get $6,000 from local council straight to the welfare entrepreneur's bank account
I am serious.
I would appreciate feedback.
When does a community center cease to be a community center and start to be the epitome of the victim industry.
By the way we are totally efficiently run with wastfull meetings fully minuted and fully funded.
When you scoff at mediocrity I see the end result and shiver.
Do you not care that you have peddled a whole lot of lies yourself in that statement, and cleverly jammed every leftist meme into one paragraph?
Er, they're not lies. Answer me this: why did Howard hold the immigrants deliberately off the coast? So So they didn't have access to the Courts. Why did Bush hold the "unlawful combatants" in GB? So they didn't have access to the Courts. He was very disappointed when the US Supreme Court decided that the Courts actually COULD intervene. But the whole point of keeping them in GB was to try to keep them away from the rule of law.
As for the other points, I'll defend them when you defend the above.
Posted by: Jeremy at July 21, 2004 at 09:35 AMRight. Because we all know that the US military is above the law.
Posted by: Andrea Harris at July 21, 2004 at 10:58 PMOoh, forgot to add [SARCASM] tags to the above. Don't want to confuse Jeremy the ignorant!