Posts by Craig Ranapia
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Hard News: 2011: The Year Of What?, in reply to BenWilson,
I think it comes down to not enough people shaking better sense into their friends who are proudly saying they will vote National just because Phil Goff is a numbnut.
I don’t know anyone who says that, and you lay a finger on me I’ll break all yours. Individually. Slowly. And take great pains to cause as much permanent neurological damage as inhumanly possible.
Perhaps I’m an old-fashioned kind of gal, but I’ve found the persuasive mode more effective than screaming “oy, you’re a fucking idiot” and wondering why I’ve got a sore head.
For the record, I agree. When 51.5% of your own voters favour an opposition policy over your own, it’s pretty clear there’s a problem.
Then again, if the question's been framed as "do you prefer the Yellow peril owning all your shit or making some rich prick cry?" (and I can't find the questions asked anywhere), I'd agree there's a problem but where it lies isn't entirely clear to me. Who knows, perhaps Labour is doing something right by accident.
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Hard News: 2011: The Year Of What?, in reply to Bart Janssen,
When they blocked police access they declared they cared not at all for the truth, no matter how ugly that truth might be.
One small point of order: We might all want to be careful to keep a clear distinction between people exercising their right to silence and potentially defamatory allegations of obstruction.
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Hard News: 2011: The Year Of What?, in reply to Sacha,
Judging by the seeming inability of some Labour MPs to keep their feet out of their mouths I’d say you’re dreeaming
Jeebus Crust, and I always thought Curran was relatively sane. I guess we're seeing the first hints of a Green class traitors/"stab in the back" meme if the election turns into Labour's '02. Really, Greenies, how fucking dare you be all green and shit?
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Hard News: Angry and thrilled about Arie, in reply to Russell Brown,
Yeah, that’s linked above. It’s the one where the police explain that it took them six months to establish there was a defence of diminished responsibility, during which time they had to repeatedly refuse diversion because – wait for it – there was a defence of diminished responsibility.
Kafka, call your office...
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Hard News: 2011: The Year Of What?, in reply to Cecelia,
This is my personal minor earthquake – that a columnist I admire could sympathise with a book written by Ian Wishart and which is pretty obviously biased. Maybe it’s a Christian thing.
Maybe the “thing’ is that the right to silence, due process and a fair trial in court of law instead of on-line lynch mobs applies to everyone – even if we don’t like them very much.
And yeah, I agree with Misa that whatever you think about Wishart (I wouldn’t piss on him if his head was on fire, for the record) perhaps King shouldn’t be used as a cudgel to beat him with. Here’s a mad idea – if our beloved “mainstream” media didn’t treat child deaths and neglect as sensational torture porn served in a thick crust of moralistic bullshit perhaps King wouldn’t have felt the need to talk to the evil one in the first place?
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Hard News: Angry and thrilled about Arie, in reply to Danielle,
Honestly, just how hard is it for these people to put out a politely-worded ‘yeah, we totally fucked up this whole thing’?
Nigh on impossible, really. And while the O'Connor-McVicar axis of stupid will dismiss that as 'cop bashing', it really is well past time for usual suspects to ask themselves whether the Police really do themselves (or anyone else) any favours by going into siege mode at any criticism.
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Muse: Start The Week, in reply to Anne M,
Oh, that would be nice but no. :) At the moment, my paid book pimpage is happening in the pages of the Listener -- which, in a odd coincidence, I have to deliver two reviews by morning tea time tomorrow.
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Hard News: Angry and thrilled about Arie, in reply to Stephen Judd,
I think The Press’ headline is… unfortunate. Looter. Really?
Yup. I really don't know what part of "alleged" or the whole trivial distinction between a charge and a conviction is so bloody challenging, but I've given up expecting better.
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Muse: Start The Week, in reply to Rich Lock,
For anyone who wants to know more about Robert Crumb, may I recommend searching out a copy of the 1994 documentary ’Crumb’.
I will heartily endorse that recommendation – it has recently been spiffed up and re-released by Criterion along with Terry Zwigoff’s little-seen first film Louie Bluie. (There a really interesting interview with Zwigoff here. Come December, I'm probably going to start howling "fuck me, Santa" at unfortunate moments - thanks for nothing, Terry.)
Though the really disturbing (and sad) thing about the film is coming to realize that however horrendously fucked up Bob is, he’s the well-adjusted one in his family.
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I do have my doubts my Crumb was in serious risk of being assassinated by enraged tabloid-reading Sydney-siders, and his reputation is based on (to put it politely) there being no such thing as over-sharing his self-loathing and sexual neurosis. But, on the gripping hand, I can understand why he wasn't that enthusiastic about walking into a Murdoch tabloid moral panic.
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