Crisis For Solar Power

Let's Not Screw This Up Kruddie!

Here's an article that should be read, about the state of solar power in Australia.

Australian support for the solar industry is faltering just as the technology promises to deliver baseload power.

Recent breakthroughs in concentrating solar power technology allow heat energy to be stored almost indefinitely - in molten salts - and dispatched as needed.

The Andasol parabolic trough solar thermal plant near Guadiz in Spain, developed and operated by German company Solar Millenium (which has an Australasian joint venture with Leighton Contractors), generates 50MW of clean electricity with enough storage to run for 7.5 hours without sun and around the clock in summer.

Spanish company Torresol, in joint venture with giant Middle-Eastern clean energy investor MASDAR - which is sniffing for opportunities in Australia - is developing other solar thermal projects near Seville and Cediz.

And there's plenty more coming with Bloomberg reporting 14000MW of solar thermal power stations are in the pipeline in Spain alone. That's enough clean power to run NSW, according to Matthew Wright, of Melbourne-based advocacy group Beyond Zero Emissions.

In the United States, SolarReserve and a division of giant defence contractor United Technologies plan a series of solar thermal "power towers'' in the Californian desert - generating between 50MW and 300MW each - again using molten salts to store energy and able to run 15 hours without sun.

The US Department of Energy predicts that by 2020 concentrating solar thermal power stations with storage will generate clean electricity at a cost of US3c to US6c per kilowatt hour. That's comparable with the cost of existing (and heavily-subsidised) coal-fired power and way cheaper than if the unknown additional cost of carbon capture and storage (CCS) was factored in.

Even better solar technology is being developed here, at the Australian National University, using super-heated ammonia to store energy. A company called Wizard Power is joint venturing with ANU to commercialise the process.

John Grimes, chief executive of the Australian New Zealand Solar Energy Society, fears a bitter replay of earlier brain drains.

"Australian scientists and research and development are at the leading edge of the world,'' he says. "What we lack is government support to commercialise and capitalise on that research.

"We will be the dumb consumers of the technology that we invented.''

Of course the Federal Government turns around and sends mixed signals. While it will fund solar power stations, it has effectively pulled the rug out from under the domestic Photo-Voltaics. It means that most households have minimal incentiveto move to solar power, and that the very manufacturers have deserted Australian markets.

The Federal government really needs to look at the Solar Energy Industry more seriously rather than pretend it's some kind of unviable Science Fiction. The carbon capture schemes they're putting a lot of money in is a lot more fanciful than what the Solar Energy Industry is offering.

Global Fried Chicken Critique

What Were We Doing Before The GFC?

Here's a cool article in the SMH. The juiciest bit is here:

It would be nice if we could rule out the next Great Depression as a result of such committed actions. But the evidence on a worldwide basis is muted at best. Two economists, Barry Eichengreen and Kevin O'Rourke, have tracked the current crisis against the falls that occurred during the Great Depression. Their conclusions, updated this month, are unsettling: "World industrial production continues to track closely the 1930s fall, with no clear signs of 'green shoots' as [Bernanke] had labelled the recent signals of incipient recovery; world stock markets have rebounded a bit since March, and world trade has stabilised, but these are still following paths far below the ones they followed in the Great Depression." (See graphs, right)

The main difference, they point out, is the unprecedented policy response.

Bernanke's co-authored textbook, Macroeconomics, gives a flavour for how far we have moved from established economic practice, with governments of all stripes printing huge amounts of money to fund the spending packages.

"Heavy reliance on seignorage [printing money] usually occurs in war-torn or developing countries, in which military or social conditions dictate levels of government spending well above what the country can raise in taxes or borrow from the public." Usually. But now is not "usually".

The sheer amount of global government spending, without precedent in history, means predictability is very low. The economy takes off like a rocket? Maybe. The huge deficits used to fund the spending create - as a natural consequence - inflation? Maybe. A long, slow, grinding recession after depression is averted, akin to Japan's lost decade? Again, maybe.

While all this may seem fatalistic, it gives some context to the huge diversity of opinions about the world economy.

Central to the future is whether we have learned anything. The philosopher Herbert Spencer once observed: "The ultimate result of shielding man from the effects of folly is to people the world with fools."

To the detriment of former Federal Reserve governor Alan Greenspan's reputation, we were all fools after the Federal Reserve "saved" the US economy from the fallout of the dotcom bubble by keeping official interest rates low and alleviating the 2001 recession.

Yes indeed. So it would seem we are slap bang in the middle of an economic Depression which we've muted to a recession with gobs of public debt, that in turn will mute recovery for decades to come. Thus it seems we certainly won't be seeing the likes of recent prosperity for a good while yet. It really sucks to realise this, but there's not much you can do.

The prosperity itself was an unsustainable mirage. I don't think this reality has sunk in to the world just yet as I see the barrage of expensive Eurocars banked up in peak hour traffic. Or the insane consumerism that I see on weekends. It's as if people are in denial or they're indulging in expenditure as a way not to think about things too deeply. I'm sure people are cutting costs but you can't see it when everybody is out there in consumerland pushing trolleys like it's Christmas.

What I Did With My KRudd Money

I've spent it on dentistry. I was listening to the dentists and his assistant talking about the 90million lottery, as my jaw lay open, implements prodding around my teeth and gums. They were discussing what they might do if they won 90million dollars. My dentist said he would opt to work 6 days a week instead of 7.

"What?" I asked."You're saying you'd just keep working even with 90 million in the bank?"

"Yes," he said. "I quite like dentistry. I enjoy every moment I'm doing this. I love it, so I'd like to keep doing this."

I blurted out, "Doc, I love you man. I'm gonna keep on coming here."

Yankees Update 28/06/09

Marginally Better

After a moribund 3-3 week, the Yankees wen 3-2 this week. They ended up dropping that series in Florida and went on to lose the first game in Atlanta. During this time, A-Rod sat out to rest his hip. The loss in Atlanta was particularly galling because Chien-Ming Wang actually pitched all right but the bats went quiet.

After that, A-Rod came back and the Yankees won the next two in Atlanta and trundled back in to NYC to play the Mets again,this time at Citifield. The Mets obligingly committed 3 errors in an inning and the Yankees steam-rolled them for a 9-1 win. The problem with this is that Jeter and Damon are now out with the flu,

It either looks like the Yankees turned it around or they are a streaky team with bad patches. In any case they are 4 behind the Red Sox.

Brett Gardner Is Back

Just as Melky Cabrera faded back to Melky-ness Brett Gardner has found himself back in Centerfield. After his 5-for-6 haul with 1 HR, and in 170PAs, he is hitting .303/.374/.441. He's at about 18 batting runs above an Average CF, and 34 batting runs above replacement level across a 650PA season.

Most encouraging to me is that Gardner's strikeout rate is much lower than projected. Gardner was projected to strike out in about 20% of his PAs based on his MLEs. He's striking out 12% of the time. He was projected to walk in about 10.5% of his PAs, and he's walking in 9.7% of them, so his BB rate hasn't suffered all that much from any change in approach he may have made to cut down on his Ks.

Like most statheads, I harp on sample size. 170 PAs are not enough to definitively say Gardner's going to be a starting caliber MLB CF. Still, part of the concerns about Gardner's game translating to the majors were based on his supposed physical limitations, particularly in the area of power, and his high strikeout rate. So far this season, we are seeing at least some evidence that those concerns may have been overblown and Gardner's game may be able to play at the major league level, so let's enjoy it while it lasts.

Makes plenty of sense to me. Brett Gardner is hitting .387 in his last 27 games. That .374 OBP means he's a decent threat to pitchers and once he's on base, he steals bases at a very high percentage. He may yet turn into a Mickey Rivers/Kenny Lofton type of player, which is very useful.

His BABIP is .336 which is actually not as high as you would think. As a player who normally has about a 050 - .070 gap between his BABIP and BA, he's arguably been unlucky for his usual play style. That is to say, he could actually get a higher BABIP and with it his average may actually rise. I know, it's a bit bullish, but I don't think super-fast guys sport a BABIP of .336. (For example, Jeter's career rate is .360.)

A closer look at his BABIP reveals that hi LD% is 21.9 this season, up 4.9% from his 2008 figure. This is pretty good, and an added reason fro optimism.

Xavier Nady's Injury Woes

Nady, on his way back to the big club through rehab assignments has re-injured his elbow. It's looking like a second Tommy John surgery for him, which is both rare and sad. He was in his contract walk year so this affects him greatly. If he goes under the knife now, he won't be back until 2011. He'll essentially be doing his entire rehab as a free agent.

I don't know what the Yankees are going to do when all is said and done but it's unlikey he's going to be back. If you work back from the results, that trade to the Pirates hasn't worked out well at all, given that the Yankees missed out on the post-season last year and Damaso Marte hs been largely missing with injury as well this year.

Jeter and Matsui Turned 35

Added to the fact that Michael Jackson just died at age 50, I don't think I recognise the world any more!

Malcolm's Malcontents

This Can't Be A Coincidence Can It?

It's interesting how within a week of politics we saw Peter Costello call it quits, and Malcolm Tunrbull blow himself up with the fake e-mail case. I've been thinking about this a bit as you know and I'm guessing now that the attack on the Prime Minster was most likely discussed by the Senior Libs at some point. My guess is that Peter Costello took one look at what Malcolm Turnbull was pushing for and decided he wanted no part of it. He may have even been defiant and pointed in his objection, but no matter, Turnbull was going to go for it.

I would imagine Peter Costello would have said, "you can't go ahead if you haven't verified the e-mail."

To which Turnbull might have replied, "mate, it's from my secret mole in the Treasury, it's true blue legit."

"Yes," Peter Costello might have asked, "but how can you verify this thing?"

To which Malcolm Turnbull would have said, "you can't, because if you asked for verification, we'd tip our fucking hand to the Government."

"So you don't have any real verification, do you?" Costello would have said.

"But it come from a trusted source," Turnbull would have declared.

At which point I imagine Costello would have rolled his eyeballs and said "Mate, if you're doing this, then I'm out."

"what do you mean out? You're a back-bencher already!" Turnbull might have said.

"I'm quiting politics if you're going ahead with this stupid plan."

"Fine, I'll have your resignation in the morning!" Tunrbull might have said, and so Costello kicked off the week by calling it quits.

What I'm conjecturing is that it's no coincidence that these 2 events took place in the same week. Which leads me to my next observation, just how long will the Libs take of this punishment before they dump Mr. Turnbull and beg Mr. Costello to stay on?

Obituaries for Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett

Michael Jackson 1958-2009

Pop icon and the man who defined the MTV approach to music marketing, Michael Jackson has died.

More Reports | 6:29 p.m. “A lot will be said about Michael Jackson as we learn more about this story,” Brian Williams said on the “NBC Nightly News.”

“He was incredibly talented, a child star who was an adult with deep troubles and physical and mental health issues.”

The reports of Mr. Jackson’s death ricocheted around the world with remarkable speed. The news led Friday morning newscasts in Japan.

CBS and ABC are also reporting the news, standing on their own reporting now.

L.A. Times Reports Jackson Is Dead | 6:24 p.m. The newspaper cited “city and law enforcement sources.” The networks and CNN are also broadcasting the news, citing the Times story.

Reports: Jackson in a Coma | 6:15 p.m. Several news organizations including the Los Angeles Times reported that Mr. Jackson “is in a coma.” The newspaper attributed the news to one law enforcement source. CNN is also citing “multiple sources” as saying that Mr. Jackson is in a coma.

Updated | 6:11 p.m. LOS ANGELES – An unconscious Michael Jackson was rushed to UCLA Medical Center on Thursday afternoon by paramedics who performed C.P.R., according to the Los Angeles Fire Department.

And so it went.

He's a lot more than the simple appellations and epithets, and his passing reminds us that nothing in the flesh is eternal. Yes, and he sure did alter his flesh quite a bit. If ever there was a signpost for scary plastic surgery, Michael Jackson was it. He constantly transformed himself like one of the monsters in his 'Thriller' film clip.

The aspect of Michael Jackson that I will always remember is the glavanising, boundary crossing power of his music, which I actually held in suspician for the better part of the 1980s. It was only in the 1990s with the release of 'History' that I went and bought something of his ouvre. Until then the only thing I had was the '45 of 'Beat It' for the Eddie Van Halen solo.

In hindsight it is clear to see the lasting impact of the Thriller album to totally transform the music industry. If the transition from LPs to CDs was killing the AOR thing, then the album full of hit-singles propelled by video clips on MTV essentially buried album-oriented rock. Over a quarter of a century later, the music industry would still like to see an album with lost of hit singles than a considered series of song with an over-arching concept.

So while he created a new landscape, he also demolished the old one. Maybe it was a good thing, maybe it wasn't. In the long run, his music will be seen more and more as a sign of the times than the curios that they were, adorned with his ever-changing face and skin tone.

Perhaps that is being harsh. On his best days, Michael Jackson's song contained within them the transformative power of music and carried with it the distinctly American ideology into parts of the world that were highly resistant. His music was heard in the old communist block as well as Communist China, Vietnam and all over India and Africa. He was embraced as a man who sang we are the world.

If there is one thing I can say about Michael Jackson today, is that it would be best to remember him for his best moments rather than all the sordid rumours, speculations and trials for child molestation and eccentric behaviour.

UPDATE: Here is my tribute to the man, with the help of Mr. Clay Potts.

Charlie's Most Loved Angel, Farah Fawcett 1947-2009

Farah Fawcett wasn't just a name, she was like a sexual position men fantasised about. She defined the blonde bombshell in the 1970s, and in turn was defined as leading angels in Charlies' Angels, and then faded into obscurity in the 1980s, only to reemerge with a nude spread at the age of 48.

She passed after a long fight with cancer.

Her death, at St. John’s Health Center, was caused by anal cancer, which she had been battling since 2006, said her spokesman, Paul Bloch.

To an extraordinary degree, Ms. Fawcett’s cancer battle was played out in public, generating enormous interest worldwide. Her face, often showing the ravages of cancer, became a tabloid fixture, and updates on her health became staples of television entertainment news.

In May, that battle was chronicled in a prime-time NBC documentary, “Farrah’s Story,” some of it shot with her own home video recorder. An estimated nine million people viewed it. Ms. Fawcett had initiated the project with a friend, the actress Alana Stewart, after she first learned of her cancer.

Ms. Fawcett’s doctors declared her cancer-free after they removed a tumor in 2007, but her cancer returned later that year. She had been receiving alternative treatment in Germany and was hospitalized in early April for a blood clot resulting from that treatment, according to her doctor, Lawrence Piro. He also said her cancer had spread to her liver.

A lot can be said about her career but I won't go into that. I think it best we remembered her for her incredibly toothy smile that she flashed and the fact that she defined sex appeal for a generation of men. That alone is an accomplishment of sorts that stands the test of time.

Free Ute?

These Guys Got Expensive EuroCars!

I know one ute is causing so much ruckus in Australia's political landscape, but spare a thought for what goes on in North Korea that passes for news.

North Korean leader Kim Jong Il has put his youngest son in charge of the country's spy agency in a move aimed at handing the communist regime over to him, a news report said.

Kim visited the headquarters of the State Security Department in March, along with his 26-year-old third son, Kim Jong Un, and told agency leaders to "uphold" the son as head of the department, the Dong-a Ilbo newspaper reported on Tuesday, citing an unnamed source.

Kim also told department leaders to "safeguard comrade Kim Jong Un with (your) lives as you did for me in the past," and gave them five foreign-made cars, each worth some $US80,000 ($A100,743), as gifts, the mass-market daily said.

Just in case you thought our politics in this country had hit rock bottom, I thought you should know that there is much earth and many layers of hell beneath that bottom of the barrel.

Who Is Godwin Grech

Yes, who is this weasely wretch, an ill-omen-ed fetch from the horrors most eldretch!

Here's a sketch:

He likes advising younger colleagues on how to advance their careers, although some of his interlocutors regarded him as a little on the paternalistic side.

Mr Grech has spent most of his career in Treasury, the elite Canberra department that prides itself on the intellectual rigour of its analysis. He wears his economically rationalist heart on his sleeve, describing himself as a "believer in the positive power of the market".

In the late 1990s Mr Grech had executive assignments in Treasury's markets group dealing with financial institutions and systems and with competition and market access policy.

By 2003 he had risen to the senior position of general manager of Treasury's competition and consumer policy division, according to Hansard records. The position put him just two levels below the Treasury secretary in the department's organisational structure, but he held it for just a few months.

By early 2005 he had moved to the Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet, working for three years in effect in a level below his position at Treasury.

After the change of government in 2007 Mr Grech may have spent a lot of time responding to requests for briefs from one Andrew Charlton in the Prime Minister's office, an economist more than 10 years the public servant's junior.

In the early months of the Labor Government Dr Charlton was Mr Rudd's adviser on employment, business conditions, competition and consumer affairs. In a strange twist, the concocted email that has now involved Mr Grech was supposed to have been written by Dr Charlton.

Then, in June last year, Mr Grech was offered a position as a policy director in a strategic policy division set up for the Prime Minister.

A couple of months after that sideways shift, Mr Grech returned to Treasury as a principal adviser in its financial systems division.

Late last year he was given the huge project of pulling together the Government's emergency response to the crisis in motor dealer finance. It was that assignment that inextricably involved him in the Ozcar affair.

Sounds like a careerist conservative weasel. Why is it that these rogue apparatchiks always find their way into the breach? It's a mystery isn't it? And what was the faked e-mail doing on his computer - and nowhere else legitimate in the system? Why, he'd fit right in in North Korea.

How Now Mr. Turnbull?

As I pointed out yesterday, I think it best if he turned bear and fled. The only reason he will still be Leader of the Opposition next month would be because the Libs have nobody better.

Terry Bozzio & Punky Meadows

"I'm So Cute"

I was watching the Zppa Plays Zappa DVD and the special guest on the end of the first disc was Terry Bozzio. He looked a little stressed and unhappy to be there at that point in his life, re-living moments from his distant youth playing for Frank Zappa. Also notable was the amazing drum kit he had as he led the band through 'I'm So Cute' and 'Tryin' To Grow A Chin' and the all-time gender-bender song, 'Punky's Whips'.

Anyway, that led me to check up on what Terry Bozzio's been doing since the 70's Zappa band and Missing Persons.

Here's Terry Bozzio.

Like Hall of Fame drummer Gary Chester, Bozzio is noted for creating the melodic ostinato for the drum set.[citation needed] In most of Bozzio’s works, the ostinato is played using various bass drum and hi-hat permutations while he solos against these rhythms using his hands. Sometimes (often in the same composition) the opposite is true, where he will hold an ostinato pattern with his hands and solo with his feet. Like Chester, Bozzio developed the application for the melodic ostinato for drum set when he noticed how a pianist would solo or play counter rhythms against the ostinato or pedal point. He then applied this concept to the drum set.[citation needed]
Bozzio is also noted for creating orchestral compositions on the drum set by playing polyrhythms and metric modulations[citation needed] while utilizing his large custom kit (sometimes nicknamed "SS Bozzio"), in which the tom toms are tuned to specific notes to create the atmosphere that is Bozzio’s signature sound. Terry Bozzio’s influence has been seen in some of the most prominent drummers of today including Marco Minnemann, Thomas Lang, Mike Mangini and Chris Utter.
Terry Bozzio currently endorses Drum Workshop drums, Sabian cymbals, Vic Firth sticks and Attack drum heads, all of which have special custom lines designed for him. In fact, his cymbals were designed from the ground up by Bozzio himself, including a completely different kind of lathing method. Terry is known to use various white noise cymbal pairings, where he stacks multiple crashes and/or china cymbals to create atypical sounds. This idea may have arisen from Zappa's abhorrence of loud cymbals, so to satisfy his boss, he cut large chunks out of his cymbals, which created a "swooshy", and more trashy sound. This is seen in the Baby Snakes movie in prominence. The "SS Bozzio" is often just as amazing, to onlookers of his performances, as the drummer himself. His kit has evolved from a fairly standard large drum set, akin to that of Neil Peart, including various sound effects and the standard drum arrangements, to his current setup which includes more than 10 pedals to operate various percussion devices and dozens of drums to achieve his melodic drum parts.

This led me to a cool interview here and here. It's chock-a-block full of interesting insights.

"Punky, Punky, Your Albums Are Shit! - I Promise Not To Cum In Your Mouth"

For years this part of the song has made me laugh. To confess, I'd never seen a photo of Punky Meadows, so I'd never really understood what the hell Frank was writing about - but the above line sort of sums it all up nicely for even the unfamiliar to have a guess.

Anyway, here's the entry on Punky Meadows.

After Cherry People disbanded, Meadows and Mickie Jones formed Daddy Warbux, later Bux, which released one album.[2] Angel formed after the two met Gregg Giuffria and then Barry Brandt and Frank Dimino, choosing the name "Angel" after the song by Jimi Hendrix,[1] of whom Meadows was a fan.
Angel released studio albums from 1975 to 1979 and the live album Live Without a Net in 1980, and disbanded not long thereafter after not achieving mass critical or popular success. Meadows, however, both during his tenure with the band and thereafter was invited to join Kiss, Aerosmith, and the New York Dolls, all of which he turned down.[1]
The band possessed a strong glam image that was said to be the antithesis of Kiss's,[2] while Meadows himself became the most strongly associated with the glam persona, so much so that Frank Zappa ridiculed his trademark pout and hair in the song "Punky's Whips". Meadows, however, was "flattered" and eventually ended up onstage during a Zappa concert in his Angel costume.[1]
While the band had (and still has) a number of fan sites, a fan of Meadows has a site devoted exclusively to him called the "Punky Meadows Shrine".[3]

Whereupon we learn Punky is no longer in the music business. It sort of makes sense.

He seems like a pretty good sport about the song. The wikipedia page led me to this entry here.

One of those listeners was Frank Zappa, who went so far as to write a song about Meadows. "Punky's Whips," originally slated to appear on the 1978 album Zappa in New York, dismisses Angel as product ("In today's rapidly changing world/Rock groups appear every 15 minutes/Utilizing some new promotional device," the song begins. "Some of these devices have been known/To leave irreparable scars on the minds of foolish young consumers") before delivering a slightly blunter verdict: "Punky, Punky, your album's the shits!/It's all wrong!"

To his credit, Meadows readily agreed to let Zappa record his mock tribute to the "pooched-out succulence of his insolent pouting rictus," even if his less-than-flattered bandmates delayed the song's release for several years. "I thought it was cool," he says. "Frank is very satirical, so you can't have a thin skin. I found it kind of flattering. Around the time he wrote the song, he was playing in L.A. He asked if I'd be willing to come onstage in my Angel costume and play with him on the song. I went to the concert, the curtain goes up, and there's this giant publicity photograph of me doing this pucker kind of thing. It was like Dean Martin's roast or something. Afterwards, Frank asked me to his place to drink some beer and play some tunes."

Despite Zappa's efforts--not to mention the rise of punk, grunge, and nu metal--Angel continues to be popular. All of its albums are in print. The band is even touring again, white outfits and all. But Meadows has consistently declined to rejoin the resurrected Angel, saying that "rock is for kids." Besides, he says, just the thought of "a bunch of 50-year-olds in white spandex" is enough to make him shudder.

He seems like a really well-adjusted guy considering the ridicule associated with his stage name. He seems like he's actually quite a decent dude. I wouldn't mind picking up some albums by Angel just to see if he was really doing it all wrong. I think Frank might have been overstating his disdain.

Fake E-mails And Bad Politics

That Old Trick Never Works

Some years ago I was over in Japan just as a really strange scandal was taking place. The opposition Democratic Party bovver boy in the Diet, Hisayasu Nagata was in full flight with the 'Livedoor scandal'. His big claim was the senior LDP members took bribes from Takafumi Horie, and that he had the e-mail to prove it.

As you can imagine, this allegation created a media storm in March 2006, and as the event unfolded, it became clear the email was a fake. It was incredible because it brought the Democrats to their knees in popular standings. The electorate could not believe that Nagata and company would go public with the allegations without actually verifying the damn thing first. It was quite amusing watching the accused LDP guys on TV as they joked and said that there might be other skeletons in the closet but taking bribes from Livedoor wasn't going to be one of them.

I mean, how weird is that as a response from a politician. That's just how outrageously wrong the faked e-mail turned out to be. The LDP didn't even have to sweat it, live on National TV. They knew.

The subsequent events from the faked email incident essentially claimed Nagata's career as a politician. He committed suicide this year, on the 3rd of January. The point is, you've got to be pretty gung-ho and the opposite of circumspect if, as a politician of any standing, you're going to throw wild accusations on the basis of an e-mail that may or may not be verified.

Anyway, I bring all this up in light of the recent faked email incident in Australia.

The Australian Federal Police revealed this afternoon that the email that sparked the so-called Utegate controversy was faked.

The email was alleged to have been sent from prime ministerial adviser Andrew Charlton to Treasury official Godwin Grech, raising the plight of Queensland car dealer John Grant and his possible access to the taxpayer-funded OzCar scheme.

Mr Grant gave Prime Minister Kevin Rudd a free ute.

The  AFP statement came following a raid this morning on the home of Mr Grech and Treasury offices.

Mr Grech has been questioned by the federal police about the fake email.

"Preliminary results of those forensic examinations indicate that the e-mail referred to at the centre of this investigation has been created by a person or persons other than the purported author of the e-mail,'' the Australian Federal Police said in a statement.

The interview with Mr Grech was consistent with these findings, police said. The investigation is continuing.

Senior sources believe that Mr Grech's role in the affair is more complicated than previously thought.

The controversy has dominated proceedings in Parliament today.

Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull  moved to censure Treasurer Wayne Swan over his involvement in the OzCar affair but the motion failed along party lines.

Now, it is true that if the allegations raised by the Opposition were indeed true, then it would amount to the scalp of the treasurer Wayne Swan. But if the e-mail was fake, then whoever stood up in parliament and lobbed it going to take the maximum heat for the slander. The really amazing thing is that it in this case, it is the latter scenario, with Malcolm Turnbull himself lobbing the accusations.

Something tells me that this is not going to go well for Mr. Turnbull, no matter which way they spin this. I'm not saying that Mr. Turnbull is going to commit suicide, mind you; I'm saying this thing might end up taking his political career away from him.

I sort of can't believe anything so stupid is going on in Australia, but there you have it. Our very own faked e-mail scandal. Then again, I can see how politicians might have fallen right into this whammy. The Opposition should be moving to damage control within the week. This is ridiculous that they've run this up their flagpole without having done their verification and due diligence. It's Amateur Hour with a good dose of incompetence there.

I'm more appalled by the low standard of rigor and the intellectual laziness of these polticians. It's exasperating.

Yankees Update 21/06/09

Another Sucky Week

The Yankees went through another mediocre week, where they beat the Mets, lost a series to the Nationals and took a game from the Marlins. By rights, they should have swept the Nationals who trailed the worst record in baseball into Yankee stadium. Instead the Yankee bats were silenced by a pair of pitchers they hadn't seen before.

It's getting to be a really irritating pattern where the Yankee bats suddenly go quiet against some new kid up from the minors. The contrast is particularly stark after they thumped the Santana-led Mets 15-0 in the last game in that series. If they can get 9 runs off the great Johan Santana, why can't they pile drive these rookie hurlers into the ground?

Clearly they need some familiarity, but all too often the Yankees go very quiet in the face of a new face. It means they're actually not playing each pitch, each ball on their merits but are hedging heavily on past behaviour/record. I wish they wouldn't approach it this way, because it means they're vulnerable to these ambushes, as they were in the post-seasons of 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2005.

And of course everybody coming into the Bronx to play the Yankees are jumping out of their skins to do their best, so the Yankees really ought tobe careful about playing some of these crappy teams, looking to ambush them. I don't know what the solution is, but those losses, together with being swept by Boston are going to kill their post-season chances.

Brian Bruney

Reliever Brian Bruney called out K-Rod during the week which turned into a media circus. For a guys aspiring for mo-like greatness, K-Rod behaves more like a show pony.

I kind of like the blunt appraisal Bruney made as he pitched an inning of rehab in Trenton. Bruney's proving to be one of the wiser pick ups by the scouting department. It reminds us of the small miracle that was Aaron Small's magic year. Like Small, Bruney was picked up from the discard pile, and has quietly been refashioned into a very useful part of the bullpen.

Still, the media fracas was a little silly.

Jose Veras Released

Somebody from the pitching staff had to go, with the return of the above-mentioned Mr.Bruney. That somebody turned out to be Jose Veras. Right now, the bullpen workingback from the end is Mo, Bruney, Coke, Aceves, Robertson, Hughes and Tomko. Tomko probably got kep for the mop up innings he can pitch.

More interestingly, there's the competition for the fifth spot of the roster between Wang and Hughes. Damaso Marte is on the come back trail with his Left shoulder tendinitis, but he may be out for a while yet. Thus, barring injury and losing somebody (touch on wood) the bullpen might be as solid as it can get this season.

A-Rod's Slump

I don't know why but all players go through a slump I do know that BABIP fluctuates and sometims hard-hit balls just keep going straight to fielders, but A-Rod's slump this time is a little frustrating.

The New Stadium

The new stadium is proving to be a homerun park. It's not exactly clear by how much, but the stadium is on pace to far out-homer the previous park. A lot has been made of this pace, particularly with respect to how it is affecting the pitching staff. Pettitte's ERA away is about 3 runs better than at home.

The problem with an organisation with a hitter's park is that it tends to cloud judgment about a team's own hitters. While on a day to day basis it affects the pitchers, in the longer run it tends to affect the Front Offices more. While the Yankees are stat-savvy, an extrme hitters' park is going to add a layer of difficulty in future analysis and appraisal of performances.

Update on 'Stolen' Imbroglio

The Response

Tom Zubrycki and his two directors have put out a statement in response to the hoopla:

"Fellow filmmakers and colleagues,

We stand by the film we've made which raises the issue of slavery in the Tindouf refugee camps and Moroccan controlled Western Sahara.

The attack on the film is part of a sophisticated and well-resourced campaign by the Polisario, who run the camps. Bringing the main character out to Australia shows the lengths they are prepared to go to in order to stop the story.

We did not set out to make a film about slavery. It was only disclosed to us after 3 trips and 2 months in the camps. Originally we were invited to the camps by the Polisario. It was only after these disclosures became apparent that our relationship with the Polisario changed.

They detained us and attempted to seize the camera tapes and put pressure on our funding sources. Given they were unable to prevent the making of the film, they now attempt to undermine the credibility of us as filmmakers.

The claims of slavery made in the film are verified by three separate translators including a US Immigration Court certified translator. In addition the portions of the interviews relating to slavery were verified by Anti-Slavery International. Much of the discussion around slavery is conducted in Spanish, so Spanish speakers in Australia will be able to hear for themselves the accuracy of the translations.

We have chosen not to deal with the accusations in the recently released online interviews distributed by the Polisario. It¹s a pastiche of misinformation that's being used to attack the revelations of the film. Many of those speaking to the camera have no relationship to the film. We were warned by our interviewees this would happen.

In the 7.30 report which went to air last night there were several inaccuracies:

1. Carlos Gonzales, the 'independent' filmmaker was introduced to us by Kamal Fadel, the Polisario representative to Australia. He has in the past made at least one pro-Polisario film. He is therefore hardly 'independent'.

2. The story questions how we could have discovered slavery when no NGO¹s have ever found evidence of slavery in the camps. This is untrue. Human Rights Watch actually published a report in December 2008 finding evidence of slavery in the camps. This was never mentioned.

3. The supposed 'incorrect' translations. This is simply a tactic to distract from the real issue. As we stated earlier we have had the film verified by three separate translators, in Australia, Spain and the US. Nevertheless we will get the translations re-checked and if we find any discrepancies we will most certainly make corrections.

The report implies that these 'incorrect' translations are critical to the evidence of slavery, whereas slavery is discussed in many other scenes, in both Spanish and Hassaniya.

A Mauritanian who spoke at the opening of the film at the Sydney Film Festival said the response we have had shows we have 'touched reality'.

Daniell Fallshaw, Violeta Ayala

Producer Tom Zubrycki"

I've posted the whole thing here in fairness to the film makers.

On the first point of dispute, even if the cinematographer was not completely independent, it begs the fact that there is no corroboration of the facts. At worst he might be a political sympathiser for a corrupt regime, but it still doesn't mean he is completely discredited for his positioning.

On the second point, I don't think there's a translation problem here. It's a problem with how the word slavery is bandied about when there are no people coming forth saying that there is slavery. In other words, the distinct possibility of gross misrepresentation is what is being discussed. Not, the translation of words. That alone should be sending alarm bells to Mr. Zubrycki, but instead he would like us to consider that the translations were correct, therefore the message of the film is correct. Do you feel a spin doctor spinning this one?

On the third point, which is a re-statement of the second point; once again, it's not a translation issue, but how exactly the subjects are being characterised. It's the suggestion of gross misrepresentation that is still not being addressed.

It may still come out that they are right and that the Polisario really are putting this woman up to the counter-claim and that the cinematographer is partial to the Polisario regime - In which case I'll retract my previous post.

If, however should it be shown conclusively that indeed this film misrepresented what it was allegedly depicting, there is no way these people should be allowed to continue as doco makers on government grants.

Slave To The Funding

When Docos Lie

Documanetarists and ethics is a bit like the opening sequence of 'Miller's Crossing' where a gangster explains ethics, so I've been avoiding writing about this story because I'd rather not get into discussions about documentaries and ethics. Oh well, here we go.

IT BEGAN as a human interest documentary about the refugee camps in the Algerian desert. But Stolen has been plunged into controversy with its claims of slavery in northern Africa being hotly challenged.

The film, which screens tonight as part of the Sydney Film Festival's documentary competition, includes interviews with refugees who claim a camp's white Arabs have enslaved its black inhabitants and have been taking away their children.

But on the eve of its world premiere, Stolen's two Sydney directors, Violeta Ayala and Dan Fallshaw, have been accused of dishonesty and foul play. After they returned home from filming, they received a videoed statement from their main subject, alleged slave Fetim Sellami, asking to withdraw from the project.

In her statement, which is included in Stolen, she claims the allegations of slavery are baseless and the filmmakers are not to be trusted.

Ayala and Fallshaw believe she was coerced into the statement by the Polisario Liberation Front, the political organisation that controls the camps. "Fetim knew what she was talking about throughout making the film," said Fallshaw yesterday. "She has been forced to do this."

The Sydney representative of Polisario, Kamal Fadel, tells a different story. He originally helped the filmmakers travel to the camps and introduced them to Sellami and her family.

"She hosted them for a long period in her house and is disappointed with their behaviour," he said.

"She says they left without saying thank you or goodbye and she's quite concerned about the allegations of slavery."

Ayala and Fallshaw say they left in a hurry because the Polisario were watching them and trying to steal the footage. They left Sellami's home to bury the tapes in the desert, before leaving the country. The film follows their struggles to retrieve the tapes and finish the film.

"We didn't know where or how we would finish the film," says Fallshaw. "It was a tightrope the whole time."

The story then got a little more interesting a couple of days ago with this entry.

FAITIM SALAM says she is not a slave. Last night she walked into the Sydney Film Festival's sold-out film about her, Stolen, to defend her freedom.

Days ago she set out from a refugee camp in Western Sahara, where she has lived for 35 years, to fly to Sydney and confront the two Australian filmmakers she says have trivialised the diaspora of her people and traduced her reputation.

Wearing traditional clothes used to combat 55-degree temperatures in her flat, dry homeland, she cut an elegant line through the swathe of cineastes who had turned up, perhaps lured by pre-screening publicity that slavery continues 202 years after its official abolition.

Stolen includes interviews with refugees who say Arabs enslave refugee camp residents and take away their children.

"I am not a slave," Ms Salam told the Herald through an interpreter.

"I am free to move at will. Am I not in Australia? Is my husband not here? We are not slaves."

She said the Bondi writer-directors Violeta Ayala and Dan Fallshaw had tricked her into taking part with false claims about what they wished to portray and had paid camp refugees to lie about slaves.

"The people who made the film came to us and said they wanted to make a documentary about the impact on families. Instead, they sensationalised it for easy publicity," she said.

"I fed them, took them in, then they fled without even saying goodbye."

Ms Salam and her husband, Baba Hocine, flew into Sydney yesterday to face down the filmmakers.

Nobody's actually come out and said it, but at this point, wouldn't you suspect (if not conclude) that these doco makers had been somewhat a bit dodgy?

The dodginess extends further on the second page wherein we find:

Screen Australia gave $251,000 towards the film. It was produced by Tom Zubrycki, a documentary filmmaker with a fine history of works about the dispossessed. His wife, Julia Overton, is a new investments development manager at Screen Australia.

Zubrycki said: "The Polisario have been very good at organising their supporters here … They would like this to go away but all the filmmakers want to do is alert the world to what is going on."

What exactly is going on? The Sydney Film Festival refused to re-classify the film even though the star said it was based on a lie. The ABC reported subsequent events here. I'm sort of not surprised but find it rather appalling. It's not a decision that's going to reflect well of them into the future.

FETIM SELLAMI (translated): At the beginning she come with a nice story so we were happy but at the end when I follow up the film, I find out there was a different things and there was something behind it.

DI BAIN: But the film makers say they found a more important story to tell - the existence of black slaves in UN monitored refugee camps.

VIOLETA AYALA: This is not a political film and this is a film that highlights slavery in both sides of the political conflict, in the Polisario refugee camps, in the Moroccan control Western Sahara.

DI BAIN: Fatim Sellami is one of 165,000 Sawaharis who are in exile. They've set up camps under the rule of the Polisario Liberation Front.

When she heard about the angle of the film Fatim Sellami asked to be taken out of the final cut.

Film maker Dan Fallshaw said no. He believes she's been coerced by the PLF into speaking out.

DAN FALLSHAW: She told us her story and that's what we have put up on the screen. I feel awful that they are being marched out here to say it's not true.

This is ridiculous. At some point when the documentary subject comes out and says what you've created is a lie, it should stand. After all, and logically speaking, to claim she has no credibility when she speaks for herself because she's being coerced, when the accusation is that you've coerced the content of your so-called documentary; surely we can't trust the film-makers word for it over the subject. She should know she's not a slave, and that there aren't 20,000 other slaves as a logical extension of that, seems obvious.

Worse still, there's this interchange here with Kerry O'Brien and the 7:30 report.

MATT PEACOCK: They're kept as concubines, raped by the members, they're not allowed to marry without their master's consent and you estimate there's something like 20,000 in the Polisario camps?

VIOLETA AYALA: Yes, that's what they say.

CARLOS GONZALEZ, CINEMATOGRAPHER: During the three weeks I spent there with them I saw absolutely no indication of slavery.

MATT PEACOCK: Serious doubt has now been cast on the filmmakers' claims by Carlos Gonzalez, who's worked extensively in the area, and was the filmmaker's cameraman on the second of their three visits*. He was so shocked by their revelations that he retraced the filmmakers' steps and says he found a completely different story.

CARLOS GONZALEZ: During a trip to the camps I talked to those they claimed were slaves and found out they felt used and misled by Violeta and Dan. They feel they're being completely misrepresented in the film.

If your own cinematographer thinks you're misrepresenting your subjects, I think it's time to hang up your claims for 'documenting' the truth. This is such a tawdry affair.

It's really disappointing to see that it's the same old business at Screen Australia as it was with the AFC. It's not surprising that they end up funding a stupid doco that misrepresents people. Pathetic, yes, but surprising, no.

UPDATE ON THIS POST:

There's now a reference to this post on film.ink, so I'm going to mention that link as a reciprocal mention. I'd also like to quote some salient events since this post, noted on the film ink link:

Most of the translation Hassania (local language) into English is completely wrong.

Many of the scenes in the film were constructed (acted, cut and mixed to give certain false impressions…etc) so this is not a documentary.

The filmmakers have included in the film footage shot by an American cameraman called Carlos Gonzales without his permission. This is a breach of copyrights. The filmmakers have now been forced to delete that part of the film.

...and then:

Screen Australia has admitted that it has no release (consent) signed or otherwise from the Saharawis involved in the documentary.

There is also a serious issue regarding the involvement of the Moroccan regime in the documentary and its use of the film as propaganda tool to harm the Saharawi struggle for freedom and self-determination.

I'm appalled that they don't have releases for the seqeunces. I'm seriously shocked they've let this film out into the public without those releases in place. Where were the lawyers?

Yankees Update 15/06/09

Why Can't They Beat These Guys? Part 3

The Yankees won the series against the Rays only to be swept by the Red Sox, and then split the 2 games played with the Mets thus going 3-4 this week. It's a drag that the Yankees just can't beat the Red Sox this year. The 8-0 record this season is the worst ever. Previous worst had to go back to 1912 when the Yankees were still the Highlanders playing at the Polo grounds.

The bottom line on that 8-0 is that it's like giving the Red Sox a 4 game head start in the standings. To make up for that 4 game head start, the Yankees are probably going to have to keep on winning series against the Rays and the rest of the AL West at all costs. Either that, or sweep Boston 8-0 in the next 8 encounters. That 4-game swing could be the difference of the division this year.

Subway Series ...Again


I'm beginning to dislike these interleague games. They seem to exist just so they can get 2 of these Subway Series in each year. I'm sure it's a good box office draw, but the Yankees playing the Mets while the Blue Jays play the Marlins and the Rays play the Nats seems really daft. Besides which, the novelty has completely worn off.

I dunno. My enthusiasm overall might have waned. A week where they get swept by the Red Sox can do that to you.

Wake In Fright

Sydney Film Festival Special

I've not been to the Sydney Film Festival in some years now. I think Paul Byrnes' stewardship browned me off the thing forever, and while he is long gone, I find it really hard to coax myself into going to the festival. I'm not like Bill Bennett who's never been and hates it; I went solidly for some years and ended up disliking it. As the format for ticketing has changed over the years, it should have become easier to go, but I still find it hard to get up and go into town for it.

This year's cherry on the festival cake was the renewed print of 'Wake in Fright' by Ted Kotcheff. And in case you might have missed it Mr. Kotcheff is the director of 'First Blood' - yes, the first Rambo film as well as the original 'Fun with Dick and Jane' and a personal fave of mine, 'Weekend at Bernie's'.

I was given a ticket by Brain A Williams who kindly left them behind for  me as he hastily went on a holiday.

What's Good About It


The restored film has so much more detail than we've ever been privy to than before. I think most people of my generation down have seen this film on TV or on bad VHS, and the majority of the Kangaroo hunt in the second act happens in pitch dark. So much so that I don't think people can claim to have seen this film if they haven't seen this updated print. It's vastly superior visual experience to the one I have seen of this film to date.

It's the film that kicked off the revival of Australian cinema, and introduced Jack Thompson to the big screen. It's also one of 2 seminal films made in that year - the other being Nick Roeg's 'Walkabout' that attempts to capture the Australian landscape, people and all.

There's also a lot of nostalgia on the screen now, which would not have been there in its initial release. Seeing those faces of Jack Thompson, John Meillon, and Chips Rafferty forces you to see it as a historic piece rather than a living moment in cinema. But the nostalgia is not a bad thing in this instance. It really roots you to a point in time when Australian cinema was all hope and broad horizons.

What's Bad About It

It's a great film, and picking faults with it today is a bit like picking faults with any historically significant film.I have absolutely no complaints or nits to pick with the film. I love it.

If there was one thing I found vaguely problematic in the film, it was the vast consumption of beer which seems to almost explain away the madness you see on the screen. Yes, the bogan beer culture is pretty frightening and can cause much chaos, but we've also come a long way in 40 years to contextualise exactly what that behaviour is. If Australia is finally ready to embrace this film properly, it is possibly because the film has also been contextualised properly in the history of cinema.

The Q &A

It's a funny thing when you get a famous director and the star up on stage and the editor who re-assembled this amazing print and nobody has anything interesting to ask. You can understand why. If you could get Leonardo Da Vinci to stand next to the Mona Lisa and take questions, you doubt there would be any seriously probing questions from the general public.

Jack Thompson went a way towards trying to describe how the film was originally received in 1971, which was interesting, as well as his observation that this film enabled Australians to tell their own stories. This was corroborated by Ted Kotcheff's account of meeting Fred Schepsi and Bruce Beresford who both hold this film in high regard. It was also mentioned that Peter Weir was on set for 3 weeks as an 'observer'.

What's Interesting About It

This is a strangely haunting film. I can't explain the appeal of this film with its seemingly meandering narrative that culminates in a suicide attempt I don't quite get. The scenes in the two-up game are incredibly compelling, and the scene where the main character John almost shags Janette is oddly memorable without showing anything much.

With the hindsight you get with this much time, you can see the film as a kind of hatchling. The first time I saw this film was on TV, late at night, and I could hardly see a thing with the night scenes. The next time I saw it was at film school where we tried to dissect its charm and came away prize-less. There's no real point at which you can point at this film and say, "this is it". Rather, the film eludes our critical language just by a nose and seems to exist in a bubble.

It still ranks next to the great films of the 1970s when cinema was still raw and finding new ways of expressing things. It's like the long-lost Australian cousin of Rambo. Don't miss it when it goes on a wider release later this year.

Not How You Do It

Elections, Iranian Style

The country that offered up in no particular order, Ayatollah Khomeini; Mahmoud Ahmadinejad; Theocracy in the 21st Century;  the worst cuisine in the world; is undergoing elections. Of course, this being Iran, the news coming out is hilariously disjointed.

TEHRAN, Iran – Iran's interior ministry said President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad took nearly 70 percent of the early votes counted, but his pro-reform rival countered that he was the clear victor and warned of possible fraud in the election.

The dispute rose up even before polls closed early Saturday, heightening tensions across the capital where emotions have been running at a fever pitch. Mir Hossein Mousavi, the reformist candidate, suggested he might challenge the results.

The messy and tense outcome capped a long day of voting — extended for six hours to accommodate a huge turnout. It raised worries that Iran's Islamic establishment could use its vast powers to pressure backers of Mousavi.
During the voting, text messages were blocked — a key campaign tool for reformers — as well as some pro-Mousavi Web sites. Security officials warned they would not tolerate political gatherings or rallies before the final results were known.

Even before the first vote counts were released, Mousavi held a news conference to declare himself "definitely the winner" based on "all indications from all over Iran." But he gave nothing more to back up his claim and alleged widespread voting irregularities without giving specifics — suggesting he was ready to challenge the final results.

Moments after Mousavi spoke, however, Iran's state news agency reported that Ahmadinejad was the victor. The report by the Islamic Republic News Agency also gave no details.
With more than 15 million votes counted, Ahmadinejad had 67.7 percent and Mousavi had 30.3 percent, said Kamran Daneshjoo, a senior officials with the Interior Ministry, which oversees the voting.

It was not reported whether the results were from locations considered Ahmadinejad strongholds or where Mousavi hoped to make headway.

The turnout was not immediately known, but election officials had predicted a possible record among the 46.2 million eligible voters.

That's a lot of voters. It's always a bad sign when 2 candidates go to the polls and both claim victory. Reminds you of Al Gore and GWBush? Of course, this being Iran, the theocracy gets to have the final say and they will pick the Holocaust-denying Nuke-building demagogue that is Mr. Ahmadinejad.

I guess Iranian elections are much like their western counterparts, a kind of punch and judy show fronting for the industrial interests of their country.

Succession North Korean Style

Here's an interesting column about the North Korean transfer of leadership from Kim Jong-Il to his 26year old son.

On June 2, it was reported that 26-year-old Kim Jong-un, Kim Jong-il's youngest son, would succeed his father as North Korean leader, probably this fall at the end of a 150-day "struggle" period. Shortly before the "struggle" began, Pyongyang engaged in a series of provocative acts. On April 5, North Korea illegally launched a long range missile under the guise of a satellite test. On April 16, Pyongyang expelled United Nations nuclear inspectors before taking steps to begin processing uranium at the Yongbyon nuclear facility. On May 25, as the struggle period reportedly began, the North tested a nuclear weapon and test-fired three short-range, ground-to-air and ground-to-ship ballistic missiles.

This reminds us of the 70-day campaign Kim Jong-il directed in 1974 as part of his transition to senior leadership. The struggle then was economic, and it resulted in Kim Jong-il being awarded the title of Hero of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, a glory that is likely to be seen in the younger Mr. Kim's future. The recent provocative acts are no doubt tied to the transition as a means of solidifying support for the regime among the party apparatus and giving the young Mr. Kim some needed bona fides for assuming the top post.

I think they're ripe for another parody by the South Park boys. The Axis of evil is more like the Axis of bad governments.

Here's an interesting interview with one of Kim's sons.  If you watch the video, it's amazing how much of regular dude this son of Kim appears. Very disconcerting in that he at least has probably watched 'Team America' and understood it very well.

Bill Bennett Speaks

He Should STFU

It's a special kind of disappointment reserved for the film industry when an industry figure who got the most out of the previous funding regime and still made a parade of commercial flops comes out and pretends he has street cred because he's never been to the Sydney Film Festival.

I have to make an admission. I have been making feature films for 29 years and have never been to the Sydney Film Festival. And I've never watched Citizen Kane, either. At least, not all the way through.

I think if I did, it would somehow spoil my belief that it's the greatest film ever made. If anyone ever asks, and sometimes they do, I always put Citizen Kane in my favourite top 10 films of all time. Along with Casablanca, which I have seen all the way through, except I forget how it ends.

I once had a film play at the Sydney Film Festival. And the Melbourne Film Festival. And Brisbane, too, I think, but that doesn't really count. I remember the distributor telling me he wanted my film to open the Sydney festival. I argued that it was the kiss of death. People who go to these festivals don't want to see an Australian film. They can see them at the Dendy on Tuesday and pay half-price. Or even less with their Seniors Card.

No, people who go to these festivals want to see foreign films with subtitles. They want to see the films that have come out of Cannes or Sundance with buzz. They want to see the new Lars von Trier. Or the new Michael Haneke. Or the new Mike Leigh. (His films don't have subtitles but they're still considered art, probably because they feature working-class people who shout at one another.) The last thing an opening-night film festival audience wants to see is an Aussie flick.

And if it's foisted upon them by a jingoistic festival director, they react the only way they know how. They trash the film.

You see, most people who go to the opening night of a film festival aren't really cinema lovers. They're party people. They're social people. They're Important People. They go for The Occasion. To meet likeminded folk who they'll next see at Peter Carey's launch of his new book at the State Library. Or the Museum of Contemporary Art's next fund-raiser. These people are bankers and barristers and arts bureaucrats and celebrities who read the weather.

They don't go to the opening of the Sydney Film Festival to watch the movie. In fact, if anything, the movie is a bit of a nuisance. They have to sit still and be quiet for two hours - sometimes longer because it's an art film - and that interferes with their networking.

They figure if the film is any good, it'll come to their local cinema soon enough, but they'll probably wait until it comes out on DVD where they'll find it in the "world movies" aisle after it comes off new release. That's if they want to watch it at all, which they probably won't.

And so on it goes.

I think in this day and age of DVDs and downloadable movies and whatnot, it's a CRIME for any working director not to have seen' Citizen Kane' right through at least 3 times. So really, Bill "The Dill" Bennett is derelict in his duty as a director already. Besides which the crowd that goes to the Sydney Film Festival may not have seen Citizen Kane either in which case they're equally the kind of movie-philistine as Bill himself. Of course in their case, they haven't seen it because they think 'Citizen Kane' is mere mainstream Hollywood confection, totally undeserving of its mighty, Orson- Wellesian, Hefty reputation.

Perhaps that's beside the point. Recently Bill Bennett was in the SMH with a spray at auteur directors who allegedly ruined the film business in Australia. It's a laughable entry where BIll throws such luminaries as George Miller, Peter Weir and Jane Campion under the bus for being selfish auteurs and then champions the Hollywood model of film making where writers and directors are split up, and where the businessmen treat both with disdain and contempt.

All this coming from a man who has made flop after flop after flop after flop on public monies.

The thing about Bill Bennett's films is that they're so far from entertaining that it strains credulity that he thinks he's siding with the populist 'movies' crowd by bashing the 'cinema/cineaste' crowd at the festival. Bill and his 'quirky' Australian product has always been in with a better bet with the Sydney Festival 'cinema/cineaste' crowd than the Hoyts Cinemas on George St. crowd. It's only recently that the commercial imperative has visited itself upon the funding bodies and Bill is now twisting himself into a director for the common man - In fact it's bizzarre that he's taking up this posture in the light of his own damnable, execrable career.

So Bill, please, Shut The Fuck Up and Go AWAY.

Fedex The French

Roger Federer Wins Slam No.14

After the way Nadal demolished Federer on the slow rebound ace at the Australian Open earlier this year, it seemed highly unlikely that Federer would win the French Open played on clay. He sure didn't look like he had the game to get past Rafael Nadal. In fact, everybody could see that he could beat everybody else except the lefthander who to all intents and purposes played with the advantage of a righthander on his backhand side.

It just seemed highly unlikely that Federer would get his Slam No.14 if he had to go through Nadal to do it.

Luckily Nadal lost in the earlier orunds and so Federer was able to sneak into the final and demolish Robin Soderling in 3 sets.As a result of lining himself up with Pete Sampas, Pistol Pete has pronounced Federer is the best ever.

"Regardless if he won there or not, he goes down as the greatest ever. This just confirms it," Sampras told the Guardian newspaper.

"I'm obviously happy for Roger. If there's anyone that deserves it, it's Roger. He's come so close (previously)," Sampras said of the new champion and world number two, who lost the last three consecutive French Open finals to Spain's Rafael Nadal.

Well, I dunno about that Pete. Seems to me Pistol Pete was a pretty good player with a good claim to having been the best ever except he didn't win the French. The only other guy who has won on all four surfaces since Rod Laver happens to be Andre Agassi who also has a good claim for being the best all-round player, but I guess Federer's French Open win sort of cements his place at the top of the tree. After all, he's won on all the others as well.

The only knock on Federer's win here is that he didn't have to face his current nemesis Nadal to do it. Then again, surely there was a cheap final for Sampras and Agassi and Connors and McEnroe and Borg. I can remember McEnroe playing one Chris Lewis in a Wimbledon final once. That was pretty one-sided and it wasn't exactly McEnroe's fault that the top seed from the other side of the draw didn't get through. Similarly, it's not Fed's fault Nadal wasn't there to contest it.

When it's all said and done, it's hard to think of a champion who has loved the game as much as Federer has over the years. It's like he is up against the record books because it means so much to him. It's a rare quality in a champ.

Darling Harbour Jazz & Blues festival

It's Here Again

RF and I have a custom that we head down to Darling Harbour for the Jazz Festival each year. Somewhere along the way we got into the habit of just rocking up and having a listen to what's on offer, coffee in hand, shivering in the winter wind.

Sometimes the acts are big, sometimes they are not so big. In our experience, the better moments seem to happen at the smaller amphitheatre, thanks to its proximity  to the crowd and overall cosiness. It's easy to get a good spot, and it's free live music, so you really can't complain - but you sure can critique. :)

This year's sortie threw up some interesting band. The most notable would be the Ed Bronson Quartet. These guys featured 2 accordion players who doubled on a vairiety of saxophones; a Cello player who would alternately bow and pluck and filling in on bass duties as well as some beautiful bowed sections; plus a drummer. They played non-stop, and worked the crowd into a frenzy.

Elena Stone was more Indie 90s pop than Jazz or Blues. She looked like she was fished off King St., Newtown and her band had the effect of sending me packing for another coffee. I don't know, but it seemed to be stretching the definition of Jazz and Blues quite a long way to accommodate her style. I guess it just wasn't my cup of tea today.

James Valentine Quartet came on and played a really tame sort of set where it never worked up a sweat but occasionally veered towards something adventurous. Their rhythm section was great - the bass player really held it down nicely and the drummer had a lot of style,but the overall effect of the music was staidness. I'd never seen a set up like Ed Bronson's. I've seen a gamut of bands with a similar set as the JVQ, and it struck me that they wouldn't crack the Top 10 list of those sorts of bands. It's a shame because James Valentine is a witty guy and the musicians are good.

Dave Brewer Band came on to play a set of stuff that sounded like Robert Cray Band. That's a nice way of saying it, but they sounded like they should be playing rock. When a guy plays a strat through a Fender amp with a clean tone and is all over the whammy bar, you tend to wonder if his playing is actually suited to the music he thinks he wants to play. There's an observation that when rock guitarists age, they either go country, blues or jazz. This band made it seem like not growing old is the best option. The music wasn't bad, but again it was too generic. That sort of thing.

The crowd this year was also subdued. I've always wondered about a crowd that turns up to listen to jazz combos in Darling Harbour in the middle of winter, but each year they seem to get greyer and greyer. They also have a distinctly unimaginative variety of middle-class vibe, as if jazz music is meant to be better than other types of music and so they force themselves to turn up. They were that joyless today.

It made me think that may be the formulaic jazz of James Valentine Quartet and David Brewer band go hand in hand with a certain kind of music-demographic that is rather emotionally stilted and largely self-unaware. After all, Jazz in Australia is a bit like white people wanting to be white people in American who want to be black people.

When all was said and done today, it was more disappointing than other years but I guess I'll be going again.

Yankees Update 06/06/09

Still No. 1

After losing the series to the Phillies, the Yankees won 2 series against the Indians and Rangers. The Indians have been scuffling so that was not particularly surprising, and the league leading Rangers were possibly not for real. The opening game with Tampa was washed out, and they lost the first game. Over all, the Yankees went 4-4 this week. They really could do with a win against Tampa tomorrow.

In amongst all that, the Yankees went into this weekend tied with the Red Sox for the division lead. Boston might look like they're scuffling with injuries but they're still pretty competitive.

Wang Returns To Rotation

Chien-Ming Wang and Phil Hughes swapped places as Hughes went to the bullpen and Wang pitched the last game against the Rangers. He only lasted 4.2 innings, 2 of which were good and 2 of which were shaky.

The indication is that his sinker has got its sink back. He's steadily been reducing his ERA from the enormous 34.50 it blew out to, so if nothing else, he's probably pitching closer to league average. Because the front end of the rotation is stacking up to be Sabathia, Burnett, Chamberlain and Pettitte in order of effectiveness, the Hughes/Wang spot is now the fifth starter role. Wang just need to be able to go 6-7 innings with an ERA of 4.5 to be useful.

The Hitting Is Much Better


As of this writing, the Yankee team offense line is .281/.358/.483 for the season. A team hitting .841 collectively is a pretty solid. Teixeira is hitting .284, with an OPS of .993. A-Rod is only at .250, but his OPS is .916. Swisher's OPS is .906, Posada is hitting 1.030, and Jeter, Cano, Melky, Damon and Matsui are hitting over .800 in their OPS. That's a pretty solid team. Certainly, it's not surprising for Cano to be there and they're career norms for Jeter, Damon, and Matsui.

At this point, it's pretty close to the way the team was drawn up as an offense. Maybe A-Rod's average could be higher, Maybe Melky is over-achieving, Xavier Nady is not quite in the picture due to injury, but the rest of it is as projected.

The Starting Pitching is Mostly Sound

As mentioned before, the Starters have been doing much better in the last 5 weeks. Still, looking at the pitchers, it's not as impressive as what the batters are doing, apart from Sabathia and Chamberlain.

Pettitte's ERA is at 4.50 which is league average-ish. Burnett has had a couple of rough starts where his ERA has blown out to 4.69. Phil Hughes was sitting at 5.40.  Wang of course has pared back his ERA down to 14.46 in his brief relief outings.

Pettitte had an ugly patch in late April through to early May where he gave up 13 runs in 17.2 innings. Since then he's given up 14 in 29.2 IP.

In the case of Burnett, he's ben steadily paring back his ERA since that game where he gave up 8 runs, but he had a couple of hiccups with games against the Blue Jays and the Phillies where he gave up 5. He's been good in the other 7 or so starts.

Why The Economist Is Cool (Sometimes)

Maybe It's Just This Lexington Dude

Here's something very droll and funny.

A recent Pew poll showed that public opinion about Mr Obama is sharply divided along party lines. Some 88% of Democrats approve of the job that he is doing compared with only 27% of Republicans. The approval gap between the two parties is actually bigger than it was for George Bush in April 2001. Bush loyalists, led by Karl Rove, have duly over-interpreted this poll in order to soften their former boss’s reputation as America’s most divisive president. Today’s Republican base is significantly smaller than the Democratic base was in 2001, so surviving Republicans are more likely to have hard-core views. But there are nevertheless enough people out there who dislike the president to constitute a significant force in political life.

As The Economist went to press, the bestselling book in the United States was Mark Levin’s “Liberty and Tyranny”. Mr Levin frequently denounces Mr Obama on his radio show as an exponent of the second of those two qualities. The new sensation in the world of cable is Fox News’s Glenn Beck, who has already attracted 2.2m regular viewers since his show was launched in January. Mr Beck recently apologised to his viewers for saying that Mr Obama’s America is on the path to “socialism” when it is really on the march to fascism. Media Matters, a left-wing organisation that monitors the media, reports that, since the inauguration, “there have been over 3,000 references to socialism, fascism or communism” in describing the president.

Rush Limbaugh claims that he has seen an uptick in his audience since he announced that he hopes that Mr Obama fails. He has no time for the idea that all Americans should wish their president well (“We are being told that we have to hope Obama succeeds, that we have to bend over, grab the ankles…because his father was black”). Mr Limbaugh is not the ankle-grabbing type. He has also added Robert Mugabe to the list of people to whom Mr Obama can be likened.

Why are some people so angry? For all his emollient manner and talk of “post partisanship”, Mr Obama is just as much an embodiment of liberal America as Mr Bush was of conservative America—an Ivy League-educated lawyer who became a community organiser before launching a political career in one of America’s most cosmopolitan and corrupt big cities, Chicago. Mr Obama almost lost the Democratic nomination to Hillary Clinton because of his lack of rapport with white working-class voters. In the general election he did worse than Michael Dukakis in the Appalachian states of Kentucky and West Virginia.

Not only did the cartoon crack me up, the notion that Obama is Fascist coming from the fat, white guys on the right... I mean, come on. It's not as if the last 8 years under George W Bush was liberalism Heaven for fuck's sake.

Lexington sure makes it sound tragic, but then he has this other article that elicits a laugh too.

The writers of the Onion are unencumbered by any obvious party loyalty. To fit in, you have to hate everything around you, muses Joe Randazzo, the editor. Hence the headline that greeted Mr Obama’s election victory: “Black Man Given Nation’s Worst Job”. The Onion News Network, an online video venture, did a segment entitled “Obama Win Causes Obsessive Supporters to Realise How Empty Their Lives Are”. The camera showed pitiful young campaign volunteers lying comatose on a couch or wandering aimlessly through a park. “Who will take care of these people?” asked the anchor. “We really don’t know. Many have already driven away their friends and family with months of endless praise for Obama’s latest speech and constant reminders to vote,” said the breathless correspondent on the scene. “That does sound annoying,” said the anchor.

The Onion lampooned previous presidents, of course. No prizes for guessing who inspired the headline “New President Feels Nation’s Pain, Breasts”, or who regaled dinner guests with an impromptu oration on Virgil’s minor works. What sets the Onion apart, however, is that Mr Obama has not blunted its barbs at all. On the contrary, the way more serious journalists fawn over the new president offers an irresistible target. “Media Having Trouble Finding Right Angle on Obama’s Double Homicide”, the Onion reported last month. “‘I know there’s a story in there somewhere’,” said the editor of Newsweek, after Mr Obama brutally murdered a suburban couple. The Onion is better at spotting good yarns, which is why, despite the recession, it is prospering. The main threats it faces are that its staff might grow up—or that the earnest papers it parodies may go out of business.

Pretty cool.

News That's Fit To Punt 04/06/09

A Jury Of One's Peers

Pumpkin's evil father and failed martial arts instructer and alleged sometime murderer Xue, is facing trial for his misdeed. A few days ago I read this article and got to this bit and it made me chuckle:

Xue has pleaded not guilty to the murder and at one stage applied for bail, apparently hoping to work to pay his legal fees after NZ authorities were slow to approve legal aid funding.

He was deemed a serious flight risk and refused.

His case made news headlines when it was revealed his legal team had applied for taxpayer funds for a private investigator to look into the backgrounds of jurors in his trial. New Zealanders were outraged at the application, which was declined by Legal Services.

Then of course, I found this one which made me really laugh:

A jury of 12 women has been chosen for the trial, which is expected to go for five weeks and include evidence from more than 110 witnesses from New Zealand, Australia and the US.

A jury of 12 women! The man has no chance.

Which got me thinking... Can it really be justifiable to have a jury of 12 women in a case where there was clearly domestic violence and expect it to be fair and impartial? Wouldn't it be like say having Adolf Hitler getting an all-Jewish jury or OJ Simpson getting an all-white jury? Or for that matter the crazy Kangaroo court presided over by a Kurdish judge for Saddam Hussein? Surely the conflicts of interests are there to be seen by all.

How would it even be remotely justifiable in saying that the trial was fair and impartial under the system when any person looking in from the outside can clearly see there are agendas and interest that pertain to race and gender, plastered all over these case?

There's no way known these 12 New Zealand women actually share any kind of cultural or social values with the Xue, the accused. To say that they are his peers, is stretching the definition to breaking point. The guy might be a scum bucket S.O.B., but this jury is most likely not going to reflect well on the court when the come to a verdict in 3 minutes flat and decide on locking up Xue for the rest of his natural life.

ABC Suspends Chasers

The Chasers ran a skit poking fun of the Make a Wish FOundation. It has provoked cuch fury in the public, the ABC has decided to bench the show for a couple of weeks.

ABC Managing Director Mark Scott announced the decision tonight after the furore surrounding the sketch, "Make A Realistic Wish", which went to air on Wednesday night.

The decision, made with the ABC's Director of Television, Kim Dalton, followed discussions with The Chaser team.

"We have decided that this is the most appropriate course of action," Mr Scott said.

"It gives the ABC an opportunity to complete a review of editorial approval processes. It also gives The Chaser a chance to regroup and review their material.

"In making the wrong judgement call we have let down our audience and the wider community. We need to fully review the ABC's approval processes for programs that deliberately challenge public attitudes."

Well, the joke always hurts when it's pointed at you, and you can't help but be in the situation you're being lampooned for. Most parents of sick kids don't choose that situation out of joy or pleasure.

The Chaser boys sure missed on this one in one critical way: they decided to turn their considerable skills for derision on a largely weak, benign group. The Chasers were always at their best poking fun at the powerful, like the Prime Minister or his Treasurer. They're not so good if they're dumb enough to pick on a weak target that gets a break from just a out everybody in the community.

In fact it should be one of the covenants for satirists that they only take on the large, powerful institutions. Not the weak, the poor and wretched.

BrisConnectons Update

Auction Sees No Takers

Are we even surprised?

Troubled developer Brisconnections has failed to sell any of its defaulted partly paid units put up for auction.

The manager of Brisbane's Airport Link toll road had offered more than 70 per cent of its issued capital at auction in Brisbane on Friday after the partly paid units were defaulted following a second instalment date.

BrisConnections offered stapled units at $3 each when it floated last year, with $1 payable upfront and two further $1 payments due nine months and 18 months after the allotment date.

The second instalment was due on April 29.

Under the trust's constitution, all securities in which the second instalment remains unpaid were defaulted.

About 278 million securities were offered for sale at the auction, just over 70 per cent of the 390 million securities issued.

The securities were offered at a reserve price of $1 each, in lots of 500 units or more.

As predicted, nobody wanted a bar of this thing. Why would you bid on something you can get for 0.0001? Why would you bid on something next to nix, that comes with a $1.00 liability per unit? The mind boggles, but there you go. More disturbing is this bit here:

Earlier this week a legal effort to wind up Brisconnections was dismissed in the Federal Court.

Securityholder Jim Byrnes was seeking to recover damages including the loss of value of BrisConnections units, which slumped to 0.1 cents by October last year.

Mr Byrne's case, alleging investors were misled in the project through statements and errors in the product disclosure statement, was dismissed on Tuesday.

That's more of a worry because it means the Federal Court doesn't see a problem with the projections offered in the prospectus, which are allegedly wish-casting guesstimates designed to sell, rather than works of proper forecasting.

I guess justice won't prevail and this thing gets built even though it's going to be a white elephant like the Sydney Cross-City Tunnel.

State Of Play Review

Aimed High, Shot Foot

The last great film that was set in a newsroom was 'Zodiac' by David Fincher. It's a brilliant film that tracks the investigations into the Zodiac murders in the late 1960s into the 1970s. One of the more interesting aspects of 'Zodiac' was how stylistically, it drew on the other classic newsroom film, 'All The President's Men'.

Maybe the benchmark was set too high on both films. 'State of Play' starring Russell Crowe and Rachel McAdams is a big swing for the fences by Director Kevin MacDonald, but I'm not convinced it's as good as the crits are saying it is.

What's Good About It

Anytime somebody gives you a film with a certain amount of character complexity and plot complexity, you take it on board with pleasure. In this day and age where Batman has evolved into a critique of Neo-Con ideology, and Iron Man is a critique of the war machine within the state's need to tie up with capitalism, then it's a relief to see your main character who is not going to don a suit or leap into the sky to take down a helicopter.

The gritty realism is in its own way, a reward for people who can remember a more mature kind of cinema that seems to have vanished off the radar. Maybe our whole civilization is headed for infantilism; or perhaps Hollywood is now entirely peopled with idiots and mediots born after 1985. In any case, it's good a to see a film that wants to talk about adult ideas. And when I say adult, I don't mean porn.

Also good is the flat earnestness of the performances. The entire cast has a somber delivery that gives you the impression of a world that is a little short on charisma except for the Ben Affleck's congressman character. The figures seem to bumble and stagger towards the truth in a haphazard manner, which is indeed reminiscent of the moments with Dustin Hoffman's portrayal of Carl Bernstein. The issue is not the glamorising of the newsroom so much as the eulogising of the past glories of newsrooms.

Newspapers are doing it tough right now. I don't buy them but I consume them in spades on line, and I wonder how on earth they're going to survive. The almost sentimental awareness of the past glories in the film makes the characters plausible.

What's Bad About It

I'm usually good at following complicated plots and deciphering the motivations of the characters who involve themselves in such stories. This film actually had me confused at the end. And I never get confused. I've been toying with the ending and how it got there, over and over again since the viewing and I just can't bring myself to a satisfactory point where I understand what the issue is at the end that gets Ben Affleck's character arrested, and if indeed the conspiracy is real or not.

That's weird. In 127 minutes, the film manages to posit a whole lot of possible motives to people that might have a reason to commit a crime, and you follow that story through some significant points, only to find Affleck's congressman  hired the scary guy with the gun, and that this might have been the reason this scary guy shot an innocent bystander; which is meant to implicate Affleck's character.

And I just don't think that outcome works for me at all. After all the great song and dance about the military industry complex and a jab at Halliburtons, the film suddenly decides it's about a cheesy little affair getting covered up by a lone heavy. It's a cop-out in league with the Warren Commission. Maybe that's what the point is with this film, but it still left me cold.

Also... What is Helen Mirren doing in this film? She's so imperious and HELEN-MIRREN it made me laugh. I don't know if I'll ever see another film where all I could see was the actor acting, but not the character.

Also 2... How many times does Russell Crowe's character get to delay the press? It seems like an interminably long time followed by two more lots of long delays. It just lost me then. The urgency of the press is to just do it, and put it out there. The nuances are nice if you can get it, but newsrooms I've had the privilege in knowing are all, print facts first, worry about the nuance later.

What's Interesting About It

I'm trying hard to think of something to say here. Considering it's adult fare, it's actually not stimulating many thoughts about the media or journalism or the death of newspapers. It makes me ponder more about the nature of Hollywood re-makes and why so many of them hit a false note.

The twists and turns in the plot in the original TV series probably had more rationale that explained itself but in the context of this film, they add to the incredulity you feel about the characters' motivations and actions. Instead, you're left with a numb feeling that maybe the film makers missed something.

When the head credits roll at the end (and what a weird trend that is at the moment) you see the printing presses and how the newspaper is printed. So the film is some kind of homage to the medium of newsprint, but if you're any way savvy about film history you know that Orson Wells has done the most important film about the press and the rich men who control it. Consequently, you wonder if any of what you have seen has added anything more to our awareness about newspapers and how they are run.

How Many Stars Does It Get?

People are handing this film 4 out of 5 stars. I find this ridiculous. It's 2 stars in my book, and that's if I'm pressed to giving stars. It's not an impressive film at all - save your precious money for something else.

GM Set For Bankruptcy

Twenty Years In The Coming

The day has finally arrived where GM gets its comeuppance and goes into bankruptcy. Ironically, it won't be wound down, but be restructured under Chapter 11 and sent out to the world anew with a mission to make more eco-friendly cars that people actually want.

It's a bit like Will Smith's quip at the Oscars this year where he said he likes action movies because they have stunt, effects and an audience.

General Motors will declare bankruptcy on Monday, US time, marking the end of an era of American manufacturing dominance as what was once the world's largest corporation collapses under the weight of its mistakes and debts.

Senior US officials have detailed what they hope will be a swift process in which GM should be able to re-emerge from bankruptcy protection as a new, leaner company within 60 to 90 days.

The move means uncertainty for thousands of Australian workers. Industry watchers have suggested Holden may be sold by General Motors. The Australian arm of the automotive giant employs about 6500 people in Australia, about 3100 of them in Victoria.

The debt-riddled US parent has already put Hummer and Saab on the chopping block, along with European brands Opel and Vauxhall.

Well yes, of course! After years of resisting the actual demands of the market, GM essentially lost its dominance through attrition.The iceberg was always on the horizon, but it just kept sailing right along, headlong into the iceberg.

In the 1970s there were rumours and theories of a collusion between the car companies and oil companies to keep oil the centrepiece of transportation; that the car makers could make something far more fuel efficient if it wanted to, but the oil companies wouldn't let them.

It was a theory that rang true for many a year, but I'm guessing it wasn't true at all when the crunch came, in as much as the oil companies didn't really lift a finger to shore up the car companies. I guess the proof is always in the pudding.