pork

At first glance, it seemed the Morrison government in a peculiar way admitted its multibillion-dollar Community Development Grant racket was corrupt.

Sure, there was an $11 million gift to a billion-dollar private company in a marginal LNP seat last year – I’ll come back to that – but could the government have been shamed into “doing the right thing” overall?

After The New Daily and Michael West Media back in 2020 exposed the blatant rorting of CDGs to favour Coalition MPs and “seats of interest”, the bare summary of CDG allocations published last year actually shows more money going to Labor-held electorates than the Coalition – $177.7 million to $169.3 million.

lies...

Americans have never been sicker. Life expectancy in the United States continues to fall. An increasing number of people are anxious and depressed. And before you blame Covid-19 and lockdowns, it’s important to note that these problems existed long before a deadly pandemic brought the country and the world in general to a screeching halt.

joker

The decision to allow world No.1 Novak Djokovic to contest the Australian Open has won support from the peak men’s tennis body, who described the saga as “damaging on all fronts”.

The statement from the ATP came as Immigration Minister Alex Hawke was considering on Tuesday whether there were still grounds to cancel the Serb’s visa, after Monday’s court ruling.

It also followed the Djokovic family calling an abrupt end to a media briefing to celebrate his court win when they were grilled about the star’s actions in the days following his positive COVID test in December.

The ATP issued a statement on Tuesday that welcomed the court ruling that quashed the decision to block Djokovic’s entry into Australia.

stupid

It's been described by an expert as a lockdown in NSW without public health orders.

Although the country's most populous state has few COVID-19 restrictions in place, businesses around NSW have been forced to close due to virus-induced staff absences.

Spending data analysed by ANZ last week indicated economic activity plummeting to levels lower than any other time during the pandemic.

aggression

On Thursday, talks will continue in the broader format of the Vienna-based Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which includes the US as well as Russia, Ukraine and other former Soviet states.

The European Union, too, is determined not to be left out. EU defense and foreign ministers will meet in the French town of Brest on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. As with all the other planned conferences, the main topic on the agenda will be Russian demands for security guarantees and possible reactions to an escalation by Putin in Ukraine.

sniffo

British supermarket chain Morrisons has been criticized over its decision to remove ‘use-by’ expiry dates on milk cartons – instead, asking customers to conduct a “sniff test” to check whether the dairy had gone bad.

Announcing the “bold step” over the weekend, the retailer said it will instead use ‘best before’ labels on about 90% of its brand milk packaging from the end of the month. The chain claimed the move will reduce milk wastage.

While the terms ‘use by’ and ‘best before’ are often used interchangeably, the UK’s Food Standards Agency (FSA) notes on its website, that ‘best before’ labels relate to food quality while ‘use-by’ dates are a matter of food safety. By the FSA’s guidance, milk consumed after a ‘best before’ date is “safe” but its “flavor and texture might not be as good.”

masking

The NSW government has sought legal advice about the best way to ensure residents register their positive rapid antigen tests under new measures set to be introduced as it seeks to understand the full scale of the Omicron wave.

Premier Dominic Perrottet foreshadowed the changes to how the state processes rapid tests on Monday as NSW recorded its deadliest day of the pandemic and public hospitals began diverting more patients into the private system.

Health Minister Brad Hazzard said the government had made the decision to mandate the reporting of rapid antigen test results at the request of Chief Health Officer Kerry Chant. The state’s health department has sought advice from the Crown Solicitor’s Office over its legal capacity to enforce the mandatory reporting of tests.

BBQ…

The Omicron wave has wiped out the idea of a snap election campaign as soon as next month to deliver Scott Morrison a dream victory against Anthony Albanese.

The idea of a swift and smooth race to the ballot box was always a fantasy but an early poll was an outside chance for some Liberals who believed it was safer to go to an election in March than to wait until May.

But as the Prime Minister noted on Monday, Omicron changes everything.

The Omicron summer has spread the coronavirus to at least 500,000 people, put thousands more in isolation because they are close contacts, formed endless queues at test centres and pushed out the waiting time for test results to the point where the text messages are so late they lose practical value.

goals' '

Earlier this week, the pontiff told an audience at the Vatican, “We see that some people do not want to have a child. Sometimes they have one, and that’s it, but they have… dogs and cats that take the place of children.” But he didn’t stop there. “A man or woman who do[es] not develop the sense of fatherhood or motherhood, they are lacking something, something fundamental, something important,” said the Catholic leader, branding this a “form of selfishness.”

rats…

The government’s economic forecasts are highly questionable and the uncertain budget outlook raises doubts about the future funding of essential services. 

Scotty from marketing has no economic strategy. Instead, the government’s budget update relies on a series of unfounded economic assumptions to produce what the Prime Minister hopes will be a comforting message.

Despite being elected back in 2013 lambasting debt and deficits, the Coalition is now presiding over the biggest budget deficits and increase in government debt since the Second World War.

trick dog

John Smith often watched greyhound races on cable TV. He had a few online bets but never won much. Nearly every Saturday, he went to the track to watch live races. He really loved the sleek dogs and dreamed that one day he would own one of them — the winner of course. 

One Friday afternoon, Sue, John’s wife, came home with a little puppy. He was adorable she said. She’d picked him up from a cardboard box in the street, with a hand-written sign: Free Puppies. There was only one left. She guessed he was a cross-breed between a chihuahua and a Maltese terrier. Imagine a lovely fluffy yapper. She thus called him Yuppy as he licked her face. John laughed with a sarcastic sigh when he saw this ball of hair for the first time.  

domicron

Just on a month ago, about the same time he was dumping social restrictions and advocating personal responsibility in dealing with COVID, NSW's still new Premier Dominic Perrottet made a speech arguing the need to think about the lessons the pandemic had taught us about our system of government.

What he specifically had in mind was the nature of the federation.

"The pandemic may not yet be over," he said.

"But now is the right time to start thinking about the lessons COVID has taught us about our federal system of government — and how we can respond."

It was a genuinely interesting speech, and vaguely refreshing to hear someone sounding like they were actually thinking about stuff in amidst the chaos of pandemic management.

inventor

Omicronic butthead Smoko — Scomo for short — is taking us on a ride of a lifetime...

Some people feel sorry for Scotty of Marketing... He has been trying to relaunch the Aussie economy while the seams of our pants is falling apart. I do this everyday. I should wear braces, but I push on with untightened belts because tightening would hurt my hernia... This means I have to pull my pants up every 27.9 seconds on average. Not very efficient and highly disruptive to production.

So, while before we had to avoid the virus at all costs, we now have to ride the wave with less testing because WE'VE RUN OUT OF TESTING BIZOS. Or they are too expensive for the Scumdog government to afford as your hospital is saturated to the rafters with sickos...

austennis

It’s astounding that Scott Morrison would draw the world’s attention to the Park Hotel in Melbourne, a coronavirus incubator and home to refugees seeking asylum in Australia (“Star to remain between two courts till Monday”, January 7).