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Ha, Holden Caulfield. You are a big ☎

Horse 1293 - Somewhere up high – 13 points (Total: 203)

Once upon a time, two buildings stood where the current Myer Sydney City store stands. From 1995-1998 the to buildings were basically gutted and rebuilt whilst trade went on, and the current Sydney Central Plaza basically bears no resemblance or even any evidence of the two buildings which once were. In 2003 Myer even sold the building itself to the Westfield Group and thus not even Myer lives in its own building anymore; it is just a mere tenant.

The atrium for want of a better word is a five level cavity within the building. Given that the space between floors is also over-sized, that space is probably close to what would be seven stories tall in any other building.
This photograph doesn't quite do the gaping chasm justice because it foreshortens the view quite a lot. I don't suffer from vertigo but I can tell you that looking downwards into that space, you certainly develop a very healthy respect for gravity in a hurry.

If you try to look closely (even on the 5 megapixel version) it is very difficult to make out what the people down there are having for lunch. They are of course completely oblivious to the fact that someone five levels up is taking a photograph, although having said that, it's also pretty difficult to make out that they even have faces from up here.

I think that they were able to build such a massive hole without disturbing the foundations of other buildings and services which run underground is quite remarkable. If you were to make a list of the city's most impressive structures, this hole would make the top ten.

Horse 1292 - Getting the number of someone you don’t know – 17 points (Total: 190)

One of the unfortunate things about an economy which is flat is the number of shops and businesses which close. We used to have all our stationery (ie. letterheads, envelopes, business cards etc.) printed by a firm here in Mosman but that too has gone to the wall.
On a completely unrelated trip to Neutral Bay (I wanted to have a look at a bookshop), I saw the offices of Snap Printing from the window of the bus and since I was in the area anyway, I thought it a good idea to get a quote from them for printing costs.

Given the good humour of both Jacky Chan (I kid thee not, that is his name) who took the photo and Yui (pictured), I think that getting our printing done here
would be well worth it because if you have a good rapport with your suppliers, generally things get done more quickly and efficiently.

I was still faced with the problem of how to get a photograph of "Getting the number of someone you don’t know"; so Jacky thought it would be a good idea to get the photograph of Yui handing over a business card; this then is that photograph. Reproduced below is a scan of same said business card which actually proves that I did in fact get the number of someone I did not know previously.

Horse 1291 - 3:33am – 15 points (Total: 173)

As I write this in the wee small hours of the morning I'm listening to that beacon of "education and information", the BBC World Service. A rather angry sounding Scotsman called Alex Salmond who is Scotland's First Minister (the devolved equivalent of Britain's Prime Minister) is rabbiting on about how Scotland "must utterly utterly rid itself of the Tyranny of Whitehall". I think I've now heard the phrase "Tyranny of Whitehall" about half a dozen times over the past few minutes.

I decided that simply taking a photograph of the computer screen was neither interesting nor fun and so I left the house and walked out into the main street which runs not far from our house. Even at 3:33am the air is not cold but it is eerily still.

I think that Purranna was annoyed that she had lost her nice warm lap to sleep in and when I had returned to the house, she was back on night patrol, with the mission to catch, kill and maybe eat any cockroaches and moths which dared to darken her doorway. Kipper on the other hand is sitting in the window like he usually does, just casually staring into the night. Perhaps he is looking for the cat who lives two doors down the road who we only know as "Big Fat". I think that when they disappear under the house together sometimes, they're have a secret cat meeting and discussing secret cat things.

Also I note that the little robot with the broken arm is showing up again on Twitter. I'll probably have to tweet this as a twoosh (or whatever it is that the groovy kids say these days) later, because all that I'm getting currently is a spinny thing on Firefox.

I think that my use by date for this night was hours ago because there are little red wavy lines which appear as the result of horrible spelling.
Quite frankly, if getting behind the counter at McDonald's is a test of boldness, and getting a photo with a stranger is a test of courage, then this particular task is a test of endurance. To that end I've survived but only barely.

Horse 1290 - Reproduce a famous photo in the same location – 25 points (Total: 158)

Arthur Stace was a reformed alcoholic who from circa 1932 until his death in 1967 wrote the word "eternity" in Copperplate handwriting every morning that he was able. Though he was illiterate and otherwise could not write, he believed that it was his mission to write the word and share his faith. Though the word would appear throughout the city, he remained unknown until he was spotted one morning by the Reverend Lisle M. Thompson, taking out a piece of chalk from his pocket.
There are only four known photographs of the "Eternity Man" and all of then were taken by Trevor Dallen who worked for The Sun newspaper. This is where the story begins.

Brendan who thought that this would be a good idea for the photo enlisted my help and together we set off for the location of the photo, which was in the stairwell of the ex-Fairfax Building on Broadway in Sydney and now Building 10 of UTS.

The bulding in question used to be both the offices of Fairfax in Sydney and also the printworks. From here, thousands of newspapers would be printed daily and send to all parts hither and yon.

The scale of the building inside is immense. We we arrived at the main entrance we found that we couldn't actually get to level 6 via the life we intended to use. We found various stairwells; and could get to levels 5 & 7 but not 6. At one point we had enlisted the help of two security guards who I imagine were quite amused by the whole affair and let us into various stairwells in the innards of the building.

There will be two photographs of the same thing and the other one can be found here. For the record "eternity" is written with a wet finger in the dust (my finger), because I don't think that UTS would enjoy having their stairwell graffiti-ed yet again.

Horse 1289 - With a train driver – 30 points (Total: 133)

I suspct that the reason why getting a photograph with a train driver pays double that of a bus driver is that it is distinctly more difficult. A train will stop a station for only about 30 seconds and it's not like a train driver can simply stop the train just for the sake of one person taking a photograph.
As I was taking this, both Geoff and I had our minds on the signals changing just beyond the station. My phone has no backward facing camera and so I had to take this on a 2 second delay, but at the same time I was also painfully aware that the train might pull away at the same time.
This then is a photo of a race with the clock as much as it is a photo with a train driver.

I think Sydney has a suburban train system which is equal to the world's best. Although people might complain, it's one of the biggest both in terms of number of stations and in terms of total track length. I've blogged at length before about how it desperately needs another few lines to help decongest the city's traffic woes, and I still am annoyed that Mr O'Farrell who has appointed himself Minister for Western Sydney but hasn't as yet had his government start work on the proposed North West Rail link despite promises made by the Lang Government as far back as 1930.
That however is not the fault of the train drivers nor the NSW Railways who it must be said have cried out for years for more money for better rolling stock, trackwork and signals but whose cries have always seemingly fallen of willingly closed and deaf ears.

Horse 1288 - With a bus driver – 15 points (Total: 103)

Driving a car in treacherous conditions such as we saw this morning is difficult; so I imagine that driving a 12-Litre, 18-Metre, 23-Tonne bus must be very tricky indeed.
On the M30 bus from Town Hall station to Mosman, I usually get one of about 6 drivers. James, Yuvraj, Steve, Andy, Debbie or pictured here, Robert. Most of them prefer the Volvo B12BLE bendy buses to the newer non-articulated Volvo B7R because the B12's by virtue of having a bigger engine, make more torque that the B7s.

Especially on the Harbour Bridge, you wonder just how it is that a bus driver can thread an 18-Metre thing through traffic but I suppose that if you do it every day, you must pick up a fair amount of skill. Robert told me that on days like today when you couldn't even see the other end of the Harbour Bridge, that other drivers were more careful and were less likely to cut you off.
One of the scariest runs for bus drivers in Sydney is the southbound run from the Warringah Expressway to the Bridge. Buses have a dedicated bus lane from about Miller St onwards but after the Falcon St on ramps, there is a point where traffic for either the tunnel or the bridge switches lanes and crosses the bus lane. To pull up a 23-Tonne bus doing 70km/h doesn't happen immediately and on some occasions, I've seen drivers look somewhat worried when an errant car pulls out without warning.

In some respects, bus drivers are the unsung heroes of the road. From about 7:30-9:00AM and 2:30-4:00PM they become surrogate crowd control for school children. They're followed around by GPS and have to meet timetables and they have to drive through peak traffic as their job.
Still, I suppose that the view outside their office changes all the time and it must be said that on some runs if they get to see the harbour, those office views are stunning.

Horse 1287 - Sunrise – 12 points (Total: 88)

I don't know exactly how famous the people need to be but I was able to get a photo of David Koch, Mark Beretta and Samantha Armytage. I'm not sure exactly how strict the people who run this want to be, but if this doesn't count for "With someone famous" then it might also go into the category of "Sunrise".

Channel 7 have for years secretly wanted to be NBC in America. Sunrise is pretty well much a copy of NBC's Today program even down to the Martin Place studios which I suppose are their attempt to copy Studio 1A of the Rockefeller Center in New York City. Even the logo for Sunrise is a close copy of Today's.
Actually I'm not sure of this but I have a sneaking suspicion that Channel 7 may have also copied the logo of the television station as well from a certain TV station in America:

I had a question before I posted this about whether I should have gotten 30 points for this being a photo with a famous person, or 12 points for it being Sunrise. Fellow competitor James Noble though that it should only be worth 12, and if that's official, then that's official... heh heh heh. I will find my famous person.

Horse 1286 - You serving someone on a register at Maccas – 35 points (Total: 76)

Some of the items on the grand list, I think are more tests of boldness more than anything else. I honestly thought though that this particular one would be one of the more difficult ones to get.

In any given day I'm now running around with ideas for about three or four photos I can get, just in case one of them doesn't happen to work. For this photo, I realised that I probably wasn't going to be able to get this during either the lunch rush or coming home in the afternoon, so it had to be done quite early in the morning.

Asking the duty manager of the store wasn't particularly all that difficult at all. What made this shot more interesting was that rather than simply take a photograph, he wanted me to actually take someone's order, so in that respect, this photo is probably going to be more accurate to the description given of "serving someone on a register at Maccas".

What I didn't realise though was just how user friendly the registers at McD's are. With absolutely no training whatsoever, I was able to take an order, send it to the people in the back store and it even told me not only how much change to give but a suggestion of which coins to give out as well. It was on a touch screen as well and very intuitive; quite unlike the myriad of buttons that I remember from oh so long ago.

Horse 1285 - With a fancy car - 13 points (Total: 41)

As lovely as this Series II Jaguar XJ12 actually is, this is more of a tale of disappointment. I was foiled in four separates attempts to gain other prizes worth 20 and 30 points. I wonder which one will become my "Eleanor".
Mosman being the tenth richest susburb in the country according to the last census has no shortage of "fancy" motor cars. To get this photo was as simple as walking out of the building where I work and walking no more than about 100 meters.
I actually had 7 different shots I could have used for this in various states of lighting. There was a Mercedes-Benz CLS350, three black Range Rovers, a Holden Maloo 317 and even a BMW 2002 Turbo I could have chosen but this was the nicest.

The Series II Jaguar XJ12 here is the same V12 first seen on the E-Type, the ill fated XJ13 and the XJS which would go on to win the 1984 European Touring Car Championship, 1984 Spa 24 Hour Race and the 1985 Bathurst 1000.
Because this car was built in Coventry, like most British cars it would have been specially built with a set of faults which would be only particular to this car. Also, because it uses Jaguar's V12, it would more than likely use more oil than a really desperate Friday Night Fry-Up.
One thing is certain, I have no doubt that this "12 Cylinder Symphony" is easily one of the most glorious sounding engines ever to have been built.

Jaguar drivers for some unknown reason have a reputation for flirting with anything with a skirt. I don't know if that also means that they'd also flirt with 1980s "ground effects" Formula One cars and prime-movers of Semi-Trailers but it wouldn't surprise me. Maybe it all has to do with the phrase "I've got a Jaaaaaaag". Instantly in my mind's eye, Terry-Thomas makes an appearance as does Peter Cellier who play both Sir Frank Gordon in "Yes Minister" and the Major in "Keeping Up Appearances"

I had originally toyed with the idea of taking a picture of a Toyota Corolla and posting it. The current Corolla can be optioned with traction control, vehicle stability control, anti-lock brakes, variable valve timing, double overhead camshafts... it must be said that even a Corolla or a Yaris has far more fancy controls and options than even a Mercedes-Benz S-Class did 20 years ago. Sometimes I stop and consider that we truly do live in the future.

Horse 1284 - In church (or place of worship) - 10 points (Total: 28)

The most comprehensive definition of the word "church" I could find was in Oxford English Dictionary.
Church. 3. (n) - the body made up of a congregation, its members and clergy

The word "Church" probably comes to us via the Old Norse "kirkja" which itself is a derivation of the Greek word "kyriakos" which is the neuter gender form of the word and means "of the master". The word is therefore a pretty good description of the Church's relationship to Jesus as the master of the church global as an organisation.
The word usually used in the bible though is the word "ekklesia" which is a closer approximation of the current words "assembly" or "congregation".

If you take a more general view of how the church operates in the New Testament we find something different to just a mere assembly or a corporate body though. We find people who on occasion long to see each other, people who care for each other, pray for each other, who support each other with extreme gifts of money, time and on occasion travel vast distances; people who greet each other. We also happen to find squabbles and disputes on occasion.
The church in the bible is portrayed as much much more than a an assembly. Descriptors of it include concepts like the family, interconnected parts of a human body, the concept of citizenship and most importantly the idea of being adopted, having an inheritance and being called sons and daughters.
The evidence suggests that the church is much more like a family than either the Greek words "kyriakos" or "ekklesia" would suggest. Certainly my experience in attending church extends well beyond the four walls on a Sunday, and I would suggest that that's a common experience for anyone who's been in a church for any real length of time.

This photo is not necessarily of a place of worship as the instruction would suggest; I don't think that any photo which adequately describes a church is going to be of the inside of a building. Rather this photo is a candid snapshot of part of a church family, taken surreptitiously so as not to disturb.

Horse 1283 - A House You Used To Live In - 10 points (Total: 18)

Suburbia is an often scary place. This house which was/is otherwise called the House of Bach (short for Bachelor; rhymes with "Batch", not the Baroque composer and violinist), was my home for the majority of 2007 and is one of the former residences of both BJD and James Noblewho are both on this hunt for stuff.

I had a loft bed whilst living in the house, which meant that on very hot nights I couldn't switch the ceiling fan on for fear of accidentally being decapitated. I found that the room was quite adequate for fitting in a bookcase and all the electrical gear I had and so it was really quite cosy in there indeed.

One of the things I never really got the hang of was trying to go up and down the driveway. It's a narrow affair and the Ford Ka that I had, had a turning circle which was wider than a Ford Falcon. On one occasion the NRMA found it difficult to reverse up the driveway to recharge the little Ka's batteries which had failed because of the exceptionally cold mornings it found itself in.

Horse 1282 - Underground 13 Points (Total: 8)

I found this via BJD's website and thought that this might be a fun game to play. It is what it says on the tin, a Scavenger Hunt where you take photos of what you find for every category. The original link can be found here:
http://tomtime2000.wordpress.com/march-photo-scavenger-hunt/

I figure that because I've already missed a day, I've lost 5 points, but because the game is only young, that means a chance to claw back. Ahah, the game is afoot!

Wynyard Station only comes behind Flinders St Station in Melbourne for the title of the busiest railway station in Australia. Twice a day on weekdays, it turns into a swirling and grumpy maelstrom of humanity. In the mornings people spew forth, ready for their world of work and in the afternoon a peculiar mix of smells including coffee, body odour and maybe a hint of fried foods hits you as you descend into the stations bowels.
Without thinking, Town Hall would be the obvious candidate for the busiest station in Sydney, but it shares a load with St James when it comes to traffic visiting the city's shopping district. Wynyard on the other hand is mainly visited by business people.

One thing that the photograph can never hope to capture is the heat of the place. A 60kg person generates about 80 Watts of heat, so if you multiply that by roughly 4000 (being the number of people who fit onto two trains), then you get 320,000 watts being generated. Unfortunately being underground, that heat is pretty well insulated and only escapes and is ventilated by the passing of trains. At Town Hall further down the line, they've tried to solve this problem by installing fans but at Wynyard, no such solution exists.

The Full Album is here:
http://s945.photobucket.com/albums/ad297/rollo75/Scavenger%20Hunt/

Horse 1281 - Back to Future - Australia's Driving Future

2008:

1978:

30 Years seperate the VB-VL Commodore and the J300 Cruze. Yet something in the nomenclature tells a different story and wonder to myself... why?

The Cruze was touted as the first "small" car Australia has built in a long time, yet when I saw a Cruze and a VC Commodore parked next to each other I failed to see why it should be called "small" at all.

VC Commodore vs Cruze

Wheelbase - 2668mm vs 2685mm - The Cruze is about 2cm longer.
Length - 4705mm vs 4597mm - The Cruze is an East-West 4cyl as opposed to a North-South inline 6
Width - 1722mm vs 1788mm - The Cruze is 6.6cm wider
Height - 1371mm vs 1477mm - The Cruze is taller.

The Cruze is in almost every respect a very marginally larger car. Also the 1.6L four-cyl in the Cruze puts out 101kW of power as opposed to the VC Commodore's 83kW for the 3.3L inline six. This means to say that in 30 years an engine roughly half the size puts out one and a fifth times the power.

According to wiki (which isn't reliable) and Holden themselves, the VC Commodore was a Mid-Size or Family Car. As the Opel and Vauxhall Senator and even the Vauxhall Royale, it was called a Full Size Luxury Car.
Yet the Cruze is touted in Australia by Holden as "Australia's Small Car" and in the United States the Chevrolet Cruze is called a "Compact".

Can someone honestly tell me what's going on here? How did a car which is empirically bigger than a Mid-Size or Full-Size car ever deserve to be called a Small or Compact? How does that make sense?

And while we're at it, Holden, can you please put either a VC "egg crate" or a VK "three slat" on the front of the Cruze? You've already put that little window in front of the C-Pillar and that little black insert which VB-VH had.
Actually Holden, could you just please make the VC with the Cruze engine in? We know it will take it because they're virtually the same size car. It's just that the VC was styled far far better.

Horse 1280 - No Confidence in No Confidence

Now that this whole drama has been played out; the pieces have been put back on the board where they're supposed to go, can we please just go back to the business of the grand old game of politics?

In Horse 1279, I predicted this as the first of four possible outomes. Julia Gillard has been returned as the leader of the party; she has retained her job as Prime Minister. Everything will continue as before.

Tony Abbott I'm afraid will continue to spout the rather stupid line that the Prime Minister should be elected by the people despite the fact that this is not how the system works in a Westminster Parliament; there is no such thing as direct democracy as he is wan to suggest.

Further to this, I think that something else I alluded to in Horse 1279 was also in evidence, that Malcolm Turnbull really is the Liberal Party member with the most political competence and nous.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-02-27/live-blog-monday/3853898
8:51am: Opposition communications spokesman Malcolm Turnbull says this "dysfunctional, chaotic" government makes the Addams Family look good. Mr Turnbull says now is the time for the independents to vote for a no confidence motion.
- ABC News Website, 27th Feb 2011

At 08:51am, more than an hour before the Labour caucus meeting was held, Turnbull suggested the only real sensible course of action that the Liberal Party should have embarked upon.
Whilst there was still ill-sentiment in the air, I would have sent either the party whips around or been sending every possible member in chambers to the offices of the four Independents, with the intent of asking them to vote in a motion of a loss of confiednce. Did that happen? No.

http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/abbott-says-no-new-start-for-labor-20120227-1txze.html
Mr Abbott renewed his call for an early federal election.
"The clear answer from today is that the only way we can get real change is with an election," he said.
"The prime minister should be chosen by the people - not the faceless men."
Asked if he would move a no confidence motion against the government, Mr Abbott remained uncommitted.
"I have no confidence in this prime minister," he replied.
- Sydney Morning Herald, 27th Feb 2012

I think Abbott if he was really serious about forcing an election, should have called for a censure motion. The fact that he didn't means that although he personally has "no confidence in this prime minister", I suspect that he can't get sufficient people to cross the floor with him in his lack of confidence.

As it stands nobody holds any election triggers and there hasn't even been a loss of supply either. I personally think that because we have such a fracturous parliament, Gillard won't call an election until 30 November 2013 which is the last possible day following the issue of the writs.
Because the parliament is perched on a knife-edge, the biggest concern for a lot of Labour Party members is little more than self-preservation; I don't think she'd risk losing even one of them. It therefore stands to reason that Gillard won't be the one to call an election before the expiry of the current Parliament.

I think this line from that ABC Timeline is quite curious:
"Mr Abbott says Australia needs an election, not because he particularly likes elections or because people need the inconvenience, but because the country needs a government elected by the people not run by the faceless men."

I hate to break it to Mr Abbott but Australia HAS a government elected by the people. Australians went to the polls on 21 August 2010. A government was formed from the sitting members. I suppose that you could suggest that Labor caucus is faceless but it's no more faceless than the equivalent Liberal Party caucus.
If Abbott was serious about wanting an election, then why doesn't he just force one. The mechanism exists. Maybe he's just too poltically coward to pull the levers? If that's the case, then the person whom Abbott actually has no confidence in as proved by his lack of action is... himself.

Horse 1279 - Avalanches Ahead, Business Continues Below

I envisage several things which might result from the events of the Labor Party caucus meeting next Monday.

1 - Julia Gillard is returned as the leader of the party, retains her job as Prime Minister. Everything continues as normal.

2 - Julia Gillard is returned as the leader of the party; retains her job as Prime Minister. A vote of no confidence is tabled before the house and the government loses the support of the Independents and the Green. This results in:
2a: The calling of a General Election.
2b: The formation of a new Liberal government provided that they can secure the support of the Independents and the Green with respect to supply bills.

3 - Kevin Rudd regains the job as the leader of the party and becomes Prime Minister. Everything continues as normal.

4 - Kevin Rudd regains the job as the leader of the party and becomes Prime Minister. A vote of no confidence is tabled before the house and the government loses the support of the Independents and the Green. See 2a and 2b.

The real problem that I have with either 2a or 2b is that Tony Abbott as the leader of Liberal Party in the House of Representatives would become the next Prime Minister. Tony Abbott to me seems as directionless a leader as Julia Gillard, whereas at least you could say of Kevin Rudd was that his government did have a series of plans even if they might have been beaten down. The other problem is that an Abbott government would have either Joe Hockey or Julia Bishop as Treasurer. Hockey has the personality to be the PM and given that the role is of minister without portfolio, he can't exactly damage it but having said that his ability to hold numbers is lacking. Bishop on the other hand as Shadow Treasurer has outright lied to the electorate and when pushed about the numbers not actually adding downwards, referred the press to Treasury estimates.

The Liberal Party's brightest and most talented politician for a reason completely unknown to me is hidden away in the minor portfolio as the Shadow Minister for Communications and Broadband. Malcolm Turnbull is easily without doubt the member with the greatest degree of business acumen, having been the Secretary for Australian Consolidated Press, a partner of Goldman Sachs and the CEO of Ozemail. Clearly you'd want such a person either as the Treasurer or the Prime Minister or even both (there is precedent in Westminster Parliaments) and the fact that he's not there is I think nothing short of rank stupidity on the part of the Liberal Party.
Rob Oakeshott told ABC Radio National's RN Breakfast show this morning that if the Government falls over he would approach Turnbull to lead and be the next PM. Clearly Rob Oakeshott and possibly the other Independents are the only sane people in the building.

If Gillard is returned as Prime Minister, then Rudd will probably find himself in the political wilderness. I don't think he'd be ever given another cabinet role while Gillard is in the top job. Likewise if Rudd regains the job as Prime Minister then I don't think we'd see Gillard back in his cabinet either. I think that because Wayne Swan has been so intemperate with his outburst, that would mean that he'd also more than likely lose his job as Treasurer, which is sad because Swan is the closest thing that the Federal Labor has to a sane person.

Assuming that a General Election is called as the result of all of this, then almost certainly we'll see a Liberal landslide. The Labor Party as it currently exists is pretty well much unelectable. It would be the last thing that several Labor backbenchers would want because the actions of their leadership would cost them their jobs despite the quality of the job they'd done.
If that happens, then the fallout from this might be felt for some time. Individual arrogance is probably what caused Chifley to lose his job and ultimately saw the Labor Party walk around in the political wilderness for the next 23 years. I fear that if the events of the past week have a similar outcome, then that's bad for democracy generally.

Horse 1278 - Alleged Leadership Spills and Electoral Illiteracy

This may shock people but the truth is that the vast majority of people didn't vote for the Prime Minister. Unless you happened to be in the Electorates of Lalor or Griffith, you also did not vote for for either Julia Gillard or Kevin Rudd either.
The Prime Minister is the customary leader of the goverment in the House of Representatves. In fact the office of Prime Mnister is not directly named in the Constitution Act 1900 either. Government itself is made up of a majority of members who sit in the House of Representatves and even then that majority might theoretically be made up of one, two, three, lots of parties and indeed the whole parliament if that should be.
This presents in my mind a tremendous illiteracy and ignorance by the people of Australia if they suggest that they "didn't vote for Julia" or "didn't vote for this government". No. You are of course perfectly correct with the exac definition of those words but the sentiment that somehow the parliament, government and office of the Prime Minister is somehow violated because people don't understand the system, I find somewhat laughable.

I'd even like to reitterate at this point that although Kevin has resigned from his position as a cabinet minister, that doesn't necessarily mean that he intends to run for the office of Prime Minister. Of course he might do so and that is a matter for the Labor Party Caucus when it next meets on Monday but until then, anything which is said in the media to do with speculations about spills and re-spills are little more than a vast chasing at the wind.

Supposing that Kevin does become head of the Labor Party after Monday, that of itself is still no actual guarantee of becoming the Prime Minister. If a vote of no-confidence is passed by the house, then the Governor-General does have the authority to invite someone else to form government. It might be theoretically posible that after Monday, the crossbenchers switch their alliences and we'd have a new coalition government being formed with a new slightly shifted majority of members, as happened when John Curtin replaced Robert Menzies as PM.
There is also the possibility of a vote of no condfidence; such a move I suppose has plenty of historical precedence, although none in Australia. Technically a vote of no-confidence need only be passed with a hideously simple motion such as the motion which read "That this House has no confidence in Her Majesty's Government"¹ which deposed James Callaghan's Labour Government and installed Margaret Thatcher's Conservative Government in the UK in 1979. Treasurer Wayne Swan has also hinted at precisely that in the suggestion that Rudd was "deliberately risking an Abbott Prime Ministership"². Now I don't know if that's necessarily true but to voice such an opinion was either done in the heat of the moment or through very real naked fear.

I still don't honestly believe that there will be a run for the Premiership by Rudd next Monday. I think a sense of self-preservation by MP's tenuously clinging onto their seats would justify that. Not until the player which has made the signing appears on the park and playing, am I inclined to believe rumours.




¹- http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1979/mar/28/her-majestys-government-opposition-motion#S5CV0965P0_19790328_HOC_190
²- http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-02-22/wayne-swan-statement-on-rudd27s-resignation/3846188

Horse 1277 - Alledged ALP Leadership Spills and Dud Reporting by Australia's Sub-Standard Media

I have been following sport for a very very long time. When it comes to a football club making a new signing, rumours do very little to sway me; even publicity shots of the player shaking hands with the manager and showing off a club shirt with names and numbers on, also do very little to sway me. Not until the player which has made the signing appears on the park and playing, am I inclined to believe rumours.
The same also goes for Formula One. You can have publicity stills of the driver with the team and even have video of the driver actually testing the car. As the Lola Mastercard team showed in 1997, you can even have the whole team show up for Friday qualifying but unless the driver appears in the car on the grid on Sunday, you still can't fully guarantee that the driver has signed for the team.

So it is with politics. Politics is as much of a sport and game as football or Formula One and the players and supporters are just as fanatical and dare I say it, stupid, when it comes to the rumour mill.

I refer now to a report from the ABC:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2012-02-18/speculation-mounts-cabinet-testing-gillard-support/3837758
Speculation is continuing to mount within federal Labor party ranks that the Prime Minister's allies in Cabinet are testing her support.
There are reports in both Fairfax and News Limited newspapers that ministers, including Nicola Roxon and Craig Emerson, have been privately lobbying their colleagues to support Prime Minister Julia Gillard.
The reports suggest some Cabinet members have been warning backbenchers that a return to a Rudd government would destroy the Labor party.
- ABC Feb 18, 2012

Just because a rumour appears in our obviously partisan press is no cause to assume that anything is happening whatsoever. News Ltd newspapers have often bashed the Labor Party and whilst they haven't declared open support for the Liberal Party in the same way that The Sun and The Times have openly declared their support for the Tories in the UK, its reasonably safe to assume that they do given News Ltd's general stance. It's also reasonably safe to assume that Fairfax newspapers like the Sydney Morning Herald and The Age whilst they don't openly support the Liberal Party, would favour them. Also given that Gina Rinehart who is a mining business woman has openly declared war on the Labor Party and has now become the newspaper group's biggest single non-institutional investor with a 14% holding, that Fairfax's editorial opinions aren't neutral either.

If you actually look at the statements being made by the Labor Party we find comments like this:
But during an interview with SKY news, Finance Minister Penny Wong refused to be drawn on the speculation about an imminent leadership challenge by Foreign Affairs Minister Kevin Rudd.
"You've asked me quite a number of questions on this issue and I've made clear I'm not going to engage with this," she said.
- ABC 18th Feb, 2012

Apart from the obvious that a Labor Party cabinet minister isn't going to openly say if any leadership attempts are being made at all, the fact that Fairfax and News Ltd together keep on badgering ministers and backbenchers is an indication that the only reason that anyone is talking about a supposed challenge for the leadership if it in fact exists is that Fairfax and News Ltd together keep on badgering ministers and backbenchers.
I also think that it's sort of unfair that serious political discussion is being constantly hijacked on precisely this issue. I don't think that it would be beyond Fairfax or News Ltd to insert people into the crowd during episodes of Q and A and to be totally frank, the fact the question of any alledged leadership challenge being asked every single week is both boring and to be honest rather pathetic.

For the record I don't honestly think that there is any serious leadership challenge being mounted within the ranks of the Labor Party; second to that, I think that the reason why its being reported that there is, is because of open manipulation by the media companies. Basically the electorate for the most part are in fact idiots and if you keep on saying something often enough, then eventually it's bound to become truth, right? The whole thing seems to be only a couple of steps away from the American experience in which the media reporting of politics is even more moronic and even shoutier.

Somehow I think that the Australian people deserve better from their media outlets; I think that it's an outright failure in the quality of journalism in this country but I don't think things are going to improve in a hurry.

Horse 1276 - Nissan Is No Longer "Missan"

At 11am this morning the official announcement was made that Nissan Motor Co and NISMO will be entering as a manufacturer into the V8 Supercar series. There will be 4 cars run initially with two of them to be run by Kelly Racing and the other two as yet unnamed.

http://www.v8supercars.com.au/championship/newsarticle/official-nissan-to-join-v8-supercars-championship/tabid/70/newsid/12124/default.aspx
NISSAN will join the V8 Supercars Championship in 2013 and become the first new manufacturer to enter the sport under its new ‘Car of the Future’ rulebook. The news was announced today at a press conference in the River Room at Crown Casino in Melbourne.


The Japanese car giant will take on Holden and Ford in next year’s championship – the first run under new ‘Car of the Future’ rules.


Kelly Racing has signed with Nissan to become the company’s factory team and will run four cars next year from their Melbourne workshop. The team will have the full support of the giant NISMO Nissan Motorsport organisation.
- Via Bigpond and the Official V8 Supercars site, 09-02-12

Personally I think that this will be a boon for the sport, will probably help to rekindle interest from new sponsors and raise the profile of the sport overseas.

The question I suppose is where does Nissan get its 5L V8 from? The answer is actually pretty obvious - the Infiniti FX50.
Infiniti being Nissan's "premium" brand for the United States is the only market where the engine is sold. The VK50VE in road going trim puts out 390bhp and is a 90° Double Overhead Cam unit. Presumably for V8 Supercar racing, they'd throw away the DOHC heads and replace them with a SOHC pushrod configuration as per the Car of The Future rules.
Of course they need not even do that. Given the the CoTF rules allow any engine to be "debranded" and placed into any car (it's allowable for instance to put a Holden V8 into a Falcon, they could just as easily use the same racing engines as now which are usually Auroras and simply bolt them in. None of the diff, gearbox, suspension, floorpan, wiring loom, fuel tank, roll cages, firewalls, needs to be developed at all because these are mandated by the CoTF rules.

The Nissan press release doesn't reveal very much unfortunately:
http://www.nissan.com.au/webpages/information/Nissan_Enters_V8_Supercar_Championship.pdf
Looking through the current line up of cars sold by Nissan worldwide, the only suitable donor car is the J32 Teana which is sold in Australia under the Maxima nameplate. We know for certain that it will take the VK50VE because the engine bay is identical to the Infiniti FX.

Somehow I suspect that come mid-2012 because the J32 Teana is now a bit long in the tooth, Nissan will replace it with the new model and that will be the car will Kelly racing gets. As far as Nissan's marketing goes, it's a perfect arena to launch the new car.
I wouldn't mind betting that Nissan are possibly also trying to twist the arms of the JGTC to change the regulations of the Japanese GT500 series to have the car admitted there as well.

I for one welcome out new players and wish them well. Of course my offer to drive if anyone wants me still stands... anyone?

Horse 1275 - Something's Wrong And Nobody Notices

What's wrong with this photo?

Can you see it?

No, it isn't the sort of dim expression of the person behind the counter because quite frankly if you were only paid the sort of wages that they probably are, you'd have good reason for your eyes to glaze over too.
Nope, the thing which is wrong with this photograph is the word "mini's". Do you see that now? That apostrophe has been left to hang there in mid-air in state of complete despair. Not only is it plain wrong but it also looks silly.

The apostrophe has three uses:
1. To mark a contraction, as in words like "don't", "isn't", "it's" and "fo'c'sle"
2. To mark a possessive case, as in Jimmy's Kebab or the cats' dinner bowl.
3. To mark words which come from other languages for which we don't have an adequate mark in English like the Qu'ran or Fa'afafine, or the names O'Grady and d'Souza.

Some style guides will allow you to use an apostrophe for plurals of things which aren't actually words in English, such as the phrase to "mind your P's and Q's". I think that this is rather silly because you can end up with a case where an apostrophe has two uses within the same cluster, as in the '90's.

In the sign above the most obvious impression is that it's supposed to be a plural for the word "mini". It looks like it could be a contraction and there might even be a case for a "mini" to own something, if indeed an inanimate food item can own anything at all.
You'd at least think that a large firm like Hungry Jack's which itself has a possessive apostrophe in it's own name would have got this right but they've gone to the trouble of having these things printed and not one person has seen the error.

Looking silly in a formal document even if it is merely an advert poster is a bad thing for a company because it instantly rules you in line to be made fun of...
"The burgers are better at Hungry Jack's... which is a good thing because our grammar is rubbish".