Open letters are the hissy fits of our times, petulant and tedious expressions of collective outrage. It is also by some considerable measure the laziest form of protest.
In other words, the terminally aggrieved could take to the barricades but that would mean having to walk all the way to the barricades, standing around, feeling uncomfortable and what if it rained? It’s much easier to simply put names to a letter someone else had written in strident agreement with its contents.
There is one particularly egregious example of the open letter that caught my eye last night. It comes from the Columbia Journalism Review and is allegedly an open letter from the American press corps to President-elect Donald Trump.
As if journalists weren’t despised enough by the community, along comes this haughty expression of well … a journalist’s basic job description albeit dripping in sanctimony and self-importance. It even includes the grammatical venal sin of writing ‘you’re’ as ‘your’. Tsk, tsk, tsk.
Full column here.
Not a good thing to talk about….anyway….Thought I would check the cost of my routine colonoscopy and gastroscopy…bloody hell $2,600 my fund paid out. Gave them a call.
It would have been $500 more if I had gone to my usual bloke who now charges a ‘gap’ fee. The bloke who
did me did not charge a gap. Bloody expensive for a 25minute ‘look’ at both ends. I always get the gastroscopy as well seeing I am already ‘under’.
Perhaps you should get one of those London underground style “Mind the Gap” signs tattooed on your buttock, Bassman?
Just as long as they put the camera down the top end first Bassy!
No wonder people are leaving the private health system in droves
Another big-lie-de-jour from Team Trump is voter fraud:
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-38737713
It seems he can’t abide the idea that he didn’t get the popular vote, but this latest tantrum is only going to draw more attention to the fact. More amateurism.
This interview is bizarre:
http://www.businessinsider.com.au/trump-voter-fraud-abc-interview-2017-1?r=US&IR=T
That should have been ‘du jour’. Apologies, especially to JB!
there are many many millions of non citizens present in the US at any one time, no-one seems to know exactly how many, but most agree more than ten, some say more than twenty, Pew think more than half have been in the states for ten years or more.
do any of them register to vote and vote ? again, no-one seems to know.
is it possible that quite a few do? no-one seems to know that for sure either.
would it be difficult for non-citizens to vote?
not at all, most voter registration is done on production of a driver’s licence, or while re-newing a driver’s licence.
do non-citizens have drivers licences? Yes they do, quite a few states specifically allow even unlawful non-citizens to do this, others don’t mind.
is it possible that there are three or four or five million non-citizens who voted?
If Trump’s claims were true why is there no call for a comprehensive inquiry? There is no evidence of voter fraud on the scale suggested by Trump. You make this sound terribly easy. It is not. One of the reasons the US has such poor voter turn out numbers and low voter registration is the difficulty a person faces in registering and then voting, especially in the South, driven historically by Jim Crow laws initiated by the Democrats by the way. Mate, if you think it’s easy, drop by Atlanta and make an application for a Georgia driver’s licence. Let me know how you get on.
well in california it looks a complete doddle to vote if you are a non-citizen. have a google yourself, i did.
are they doing so, i certainly don’t know and i am pretty sure trump doesn’t either, but then neither do those saying it doesn’t happen.
He lost by 4.3 million votes in Cali, mate, with only 14 million votes cast. In the absence of evidence, I prefer to go the Occam’s razor route which means it is either massive voter fraud involving literally hundreds of corrupt city and county officials across the country or old Glass Jaw Donald can’t bring himself to accept he lost the popular vote by the margin he had. It’s not a difficult choice for me to make.
jack, the author of that Pew study says there is “zero evidence” of voter fraud. Despite this, Trump cited it repeatedly during his “system is rigged” phase late in the campaign. Then, after the election, he was denying any fraud when Jill Stein was calling for an inquiry. But now Trump himself is calling for one, against his own people’s advice, which is still that there is no evidence, apparently because he wants to be popular.
Yes John, i read the no evidence line but wondered if that was because no-one had asked the question. i certainly can’t find any evidence that the question has been asked and answered. nor can i find any evidence from officials that their systems prevent this from happening.
i did find this from the impeccably liberal Washington Post,
“Still, in a time of hyper-partisanship, doubts about the credibility of elections exist. Pre-election polling by The Washington Post and ABC News found that between 1 in 5 and 1 in 6 Americans said voting by people who were ineligible happened “very often.” A September survey found that, overall, 47 percent of likely voters said it happened either “very” or “somewhat” often.”
so the experts say this doesn’t happen but a large chunk of the voters don’t believe them.
maybe Trump is talking over the heads of the experts to the voters who believe it is fairly wide-spread.
Classic Trump. No evidence but let’s malign the democratic system anyway. What he has said is he believes at least 2.86 million votes were fraudulent, more than three per cent of the total votes cast.
Trump’s a frog in a sock on whether he should or will release his tax returns like every other POTUS:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/01/23/want-president-trump-to-release-his-tax-returns-theres-a-bill-for-that/?utm_term=.ade4a323f4fe
According to him, no-one cares about it — apart from the 75% of Americans who expect that basic level of transparency from their President.
Whatever the answer to health care is, hunt it is not. I still say remove the Health insurance subsidy rebate or restrict access by means testing below $100K. If the ” industry” is to be efficient and competitive to continue to offer value for money then subsidising the Private Health Insurance industry has to be wound back and those many $billions$ per year put into Public Preventive health measures.
http://insidestory.org.au/health-and-healthcare-what-greg-hunt-must-do
You’d earn under $100k by the sound of it.
Ahh you are pathetic. You know absolutely nothing about the industry I am in do you. Every time I suggest means testing Howard and Costello’s unfunded welfare programs to under that $100K mark. You start screaming that people on a hundred $100k are not rich. I have said here many times and before you came along to Razor/Rowy. I would remove all of the Howard and Costello unfunded welfare to anyone earning over $80K ( except for child care rebate which would stay at $100K) and there would also be lowering of personal income tax rates and a broadening of GST to Education and Health services and a few other things. On George MegG’s blog ( again before you came along) he said my proposal would probably allow for a reduction in the GST and still provide more revenue than the current set up. But I would leave the GST at 10% so people like you can work it out more easily. It would not have mattered what figure I put there you still would have to be the usual arsehole you are because it pains you that many people are actually, well just better humans than you. Move along arsehole.
I feel the anger is strong in this one…….
The Fox in charge of the hen house will not correct the issues.
http://evonomics.com/brexit-trump-syndrome-orthodox-economics-stupid/
Interesting. Still think trump spells trouble for the plant and a cohesive inclusive society where more people get opportunity.
https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/trumps-success-a-result-of-trickle-down-economics-screwing-americas-workers,9960
Trumps solution will be to stop that darn “trickle down.”
Upon reflection maybe May 8. MAAATE. Is not the best date to call “Australia” day. March 1 is probably more appropriate until such time as All Australians are recognised. Whatever date that occurs on is probably a better option. I don’t think today is celebrated by all Australians.
100% agree. Not sure of the date but I have heard March 1st tossed around.
By the way Dismal you never got back to me on the AER figures I gave you. Does that mean they are right or are you still relying on things like reneweconomy Getup sponsored reachtel poll?
I supplied several pieces of information that included links to further reports that prove you wrong. You have as usual decided not to accept it. Big Brother has Winston Smith working on the alternative facts for the ignorant like you. Move along.
I followed each and everyone of your links and NONE and I repeat none proved the AER figures wrong. One of your links was to a Getup reachtel poll for gods sake! Can’t you just answer a question?
Dismayed, I was in Darwin last year and did nothing to celebrate Australia Day and not a whole lot seemed to be happening around town……mind you it was very, very hot. Here in Penang, we’ve hung the Australian flag over our balcony and we are going out shortly for a few drinks to an Australian-themed pub……I think that makes me a bit of a hypocrite.
Not at all Penny. One can celebrate St. Paddys day without having to approve of either the prods or the Catholics or the atrocities committed during the troubles. So why can’t you celebrate Australia Day without feeling guilty. I must admit I glory in my country but still think we need to change the day so we can embrace Aboriginal Australians. It’s pretty simple they were here first and at times have been treated appallingly. The only problem is our treatment of them since Gough, well intentioned as it may have been, has only added to the misery for many of them. The Getup inspired protests won’t get anything changed, it just allows a heap of virtue signalling and the socialist alliance mob to rant at the coppers. The secret is people like you and me in general conversation bringing up the idea of a change of date. I did it at a function today and it was amazing how many people agreed. From little things good things grow.
Anyway hope you and yours had a great day!
Dr Penny. Nah just means you have National pride. I had a chat with a Dr from Malaysia earlier in the week he actually suggested it would be a harmonious decision for the Nation to change the date. Funny how people see things. I agree with him.
They say Malay psychiatrists are very good. Hope he is helping you.
well penny we all raised a glass as we usually do on these oaacasion,
i was the only aussie present, but that matters not
There is a definite feeling here in Australia that Australia Day is inappropriate on 26 January, Penny.
There are those who think it’s a lot of hysteria, but if one were aboriginal and looking at it through their eyes, it certainly does take on another perspective.
But Australia Day has come and gone and maybe things will die down until next year.
Seems to me it would not be difficult to change the date and maybe the name of the holiday – as long as they don’t add another PH to appease both sides. there are enough PH’s for businesses to cope with as it is!
Goodness me Mr Insider, we see POTUS Trumps Mexican Wall throws up many problems and cost run on’s. We assume Trump has thought this through carefully and has allowed for all possible events and costs etc including Mexico NOT paying for it!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lcsrih9ssF0
Bassman 11:30pm.
Great game , very tense that. There was much jumping around in our house after the final result 6s winning the BB game of cricket. I was worried in that final over McCallum was going to scatter the crowd with 6s in the final launch.
35 000 crowd shows the Big Bash is here to stay.
Ah I see some say “No problem” as long as renewable generation pays its own way. But wait they support $1 billion subsidies for coal and refuse to accept so called “clean coal” is the most expensive option and requires massive government subsidies.
https://theconversation.com/is-clean-coal-power-the-answer-to-australias-emissions-targets-71785
Coal also supports 10’s of thousands of jobs. Those people are generally PAYE taxpayers. Can it be simpler?
Solar PV employs more people than the entire Fossil fuel power generation industry when you add coal mining it just nudges Solar for jobs that is before you consider Wind, hydro, etc.
http://www.tai.org.au/sites/defualt/files/Coal%20fact%20sheet%20FINAL.pdf
Quote your OFFICIAL source on the PV jobs V fossil fuel. Also PV jobs aren’t ongoing whilst coal mining is.
Are you suggesting that the thousands of people working in other industries don’t pay tax?
Where did I say that? Did that Malay doctor fiddle with your meds again.