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Links 7/23/12

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Choking dog saves its own life by dialling 999 Sun. Even more impressive than you’d think. Go look at the pix.

Peregrine amazes workers as it visits local garage Adirondack Daily Enterprise (bob)

Dolphin carrying dead calf stirs emotion CBS

A social media win on Abington merger Philly (Paul T)

Aging Japan-Chinese Workers Drive Jobs To Southeast Asia Bloomberg. I hate headlines like this. Workers most decidedly do not send jobs abroad. Their bosses do.

Japan Inc. is on the march again Financial Times

Healing China means hurting Australia MacroBusiness

What the EIB makes the ECB unmakes: The latest from the Greek front Yanis Varoufakis

Euro and stocks slide on Spain fears Financial Times

Liborfest!

Barclays and the Limits of Financial Reform Alexander Cockburn, The Nation (Richard R). Obit here.

For Want of a Nail, the Ship Was Lost London Banker (Richard Smith, jo6pak)

Pawning Porsches: Top Items Flogged By U.K.’s Rich Bloomberg

London Olympics: Lord Coe’s astonishing sponsors outburst Daily Record (Richard Smith)

Wave of Violence Kills Dozens in Iraq Wall Street Journal

THE NONSENSE INVASION OF KNOWLEDGE, FROM ELIZABETH WARREN TO CLIMATEGATE and GETTING WARMER… Moe Tkacik

Drought’s Footprint New York Times (martha r)

U.S. poverty on track to rise to highest since 1960s Associated Press (Hugh)

The Minimum Wage Is So Low That It’s Immoral – and Foolish Richard Eskow, Huffington Post

US lawmakers propose greater SEC powers Financial Times. Yes, but the SEC does not want them. They are complaining about their Dodd-Frank-given improved enforcement authority under Sarbanes Oxley, for instance.

Bungled Bank Bailout Leaves Behind Righteous Anger Neil Barofsky, Bloomberg

Artisan chocolate and social revolution Macleans (Lambert)

Systemic Significance of SIFMA’s Local Response Ann Rutledge, R&R Consulting

Michal Kalecki on the Great Moderation Steve Waldman

You don’t have to fall for groupthink to survive John Dizard, Financial Times

The Great Charter, Its Fate, and Ours Noam Chomsky, TomDispatch

* * *

lambert here:

D – 48 and counting*

The man who is possessed of wealth, who lolls on his sofa or rolls in his carriage, cannot judge the wants or feelings of the day-laborer. The government we mean to erect is intended to last for ages. — James Madison

This Week with George Stephanoplous as told to The Bobblespeak Translations: “STEPHANOPOULOS: Mayor Bloomberg called for less guns while others have said we need more guns HICKENLOOPER: if he didn’t buy guns he would have gone into that movie theatre and punched or stabbed people”

Montreal. 22 Manif: excellent photos and a good crowd.

Occupy. Madison, WI: “Occupy Madison members have now set up camp in Lake Farm Park on Madison’s south side. At a picnic over the weekend, the group talked about how the homeless can live out of tents legally in Dane County. [E]very two weeks those campers have to pack up and move out for a couple days before coming back.”

CA. Top two voting: “Already, I have heard from fellow Ds in the district that they have given up on voting in 2012. My choices are not between [conservative Rs] Gaines or Pugno, but whether to vote at all.” … Police shooting: “Two [Anaheim] police officers have been placed on paid leave after one of them fatally shot an unarmed man as he attempted to flee on foot in a residential alleyway, police Chief John Welter said Sunday.” … Police shooting: “A police shooting that left a man dead led to a near-riot Saturday as angry witnesses threw bottles at officers who responded with tear gas and beanbag rounds [and rubber bullets and K-9 dogs]. Four people told [reporter Jay] Jackson that police offered to buy their cell phone video.”

CO. Perspective: “First, we are a less violent nation now than we’ve been in over forty years. Second, for all the attention given to America’s culture of guns, ownership of firearms is at or near all-time lows. The total effects of these trends on opinion and policy remain to be seen, but one thing is clear: they defy easy ideological explanation.” … Perspective: “[OBAMA: ] We can all understand what it would be to have somebody that we love taken from us in this fashion.” What, in a mass shooting by a gunman using automatic weapons?! … From Columbine to Aurora: “I remember the emotions [during the lockdown]: the feeling of being trapped, afraid and powerless, like the ground had just vacated the area beneath your feet and the only thing left was infinite gravity, slowly crushing your every fiber, daring you to move so that it could crush a little more.” Zeitgeist watch. … Public good: “[Holmes] emailed an application to join the Lead Valley Range in Byers on June 25 in which he said he was not a user of illegal drugs or a convicted felon, said [gun range] owner Glenn Rotkovich. When Rotkovich called to invite him to a mandatory orientation the following week, he said he heard a message on Holmes’ voice mail that was ‘bizarre — guttural, freakish at best.’ He left two other messages but eventually told his staff to watch out for Holmes at the July 1 orientation and not to accept him into the club, Rotkovich said.” … Proposal: “Get them out of the union.” … History lesson: “[Denver] ‘Relief Strike Riot’ of October 30, 1934.”

FL. Public good: “Golden Retreat Shelter Care, the Jacksonville assisted-living home that spawned the largest tuberculosis outbreak in recent American history, packed residents into cramped, dirty rooms and failed to keep adequate track of tenants’ health. Yet the state regulators who chronicled problems at the home have allowed it to operate largely unchecked for the past decade, records show.” … Public good: “Progress Florida customers pay the highest rates of any investor-owned utility in the state. A significant part of the Florida customers’ bills relate to nuclear costs, though the utility has not — and will not — produce any nuclear power in the state for years.” … Candidate: “Former D U.S. Rep. Alan Grayson now is aiming for the newly configured and D-friendly 9th Congressional District, south of Orlando.” … The trail: “This is a place where calling the daughter of Cuban parents a ‘Nicaraguan’ is a slur even though she was born in Nicaragua and says so on her website.”

GA. Tax returns: “56 state legislative candidates have had problems paying their taxes on time, leading to more than $1 million in local, state and federal tax liens. Many have paid them off, while others still owe.”

IA. The economy: “Roughly two years after Iowa City installed donation meters [like parking meters] to reduce panhandling on the Pedestrian Mall, the begging hasn’t stopped. Between June 1, 2010, and July 1, 2012, the donation meters collected only $2,177.95.”

KS. Water: “Have a long probe — I use a plant stake — and drive it into the ground around your trees and shrubs to be sure they’re watered 12 to 18 inches down.”

LA. Kleptocracy: “In March 2011, almost three years after investing $45 million in Fletcher, trustees of the Firefighters’ Retirement System learned that the value of the holdings had grown to $63.7 million. Days later, they filed a request to cash out $17 million of their investment to capture a portion of the profit. That same month, the Municipal Employees’ Retirement System made a similar request, to redeem $15 million. Initially, Fletcher said the requests would be fulfilled after 60 days. But before that time had passed, Fletcher told fund officials that they would instead be issued two-year promissory notes for the money.” You know the rest.

ME. Party loyalty: “The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee web page lists ‘races to watch.’ [T]he entry for ME discusses independent candidate Angus King in a positive manner, but does not discuss the D nominee, Cynthia Dill.”

NY. Water, farmer: “It’s tough, I gotta say, but if you have an irrigation source for veggies, this is the exact weather you want. You can speed plant and there’s more control, so most veggie growers are elated. We were elated, but now it’s getting to be too much for our system.”

OH. Fracking: “Dozens of community members against fracking packed council chambers to show their support of a proposed community-rights based ban on fracking. ‘It’s a community bill of rights that recognizes that the members of the community have certain rights, and that to protect those rights they have democratic authority to prohibit activities that would violate those rights,’ said Ben Price, Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund.” Huge, since applies also to food, and much else. … Corruption: “Listeners hypnotized by talk radio may actually believe government and business are enemies. The truth is, they’re partners — if a business hires the right matchmaker. It’s just a matter of whether your highways are concrete or asphalt. The rest is theatrics.”

TN. Knuckle-draggers: “[R] Gov. Bill Haslam met with prominent Williamson County Rs last week, not long after [they] adopted a resolution criticizing him for the hiring of a Muslim in the Department of Economic and Community Development.

WI. Corruption: “United Contracting has a safety record so poor that the painting company is on a federal list of 273 employers classified as ‘severe violators’ of safety standards for workers. In April, Gov. Scott Walker signed a $175,000 contract for the company to repaint a bridge near Appleton. [T]he local bridge contract was touted as part of the governor’s ‘efforts to create jobs and make sure Wisconsin is open for business.'” … Privatization: “[The quasi-private WEDC,] the state’s new flagship jobs agency is projected to spend $14 million more [than it takes in] this year, according to its own estimates. Walker has championed WEDC [as] a more nimble and effective replacement for the state Department of Commerce and putting it at the center of his efforts to create 250,000 jobs by the end of his four-year term in January 2015.” Nobody could have predicted.

Grand Bargain™-brand Catfood watch. Planted story: “Australian foreign minister [Bob Carr] has privately warned Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney that foreign leaders see ‘America in decline,’ according to Romney. Romney says Carr suggested that America could improve that international perception ‘with one budget deal’ that helps balance the budget.” … Stasis: “‘All the heated and increasingly bitter rhetoric means everybody is digging in their heels deeper, which does not bode well for a grand or even mini-bargain in the lame duck,’ said Mackenzie Eaglen, a defense analyst at the conservative-leaning AEI. ‘It definitely means nothing will happen before [the election].'”

Jobs. Stories: “‘It was hard. … I really liked school,’ said Sanchez, who has three younger siblings. ‘But if I didn’t bring in some money, we’d lose our house.'”

“The economy.” Modifiers matter: “Whose economy are they talking about?” I’ve been saying “When you hear ‘the economy’ ask ‘Whose economy?'” for years, so it’s nice to have at least one ally in this lonely crusade.

The trail. Why not: “Human candidates have had their chance in Washington, with dubious results of late: nowhere does it say in the Constitution that the president cannot be a cat.” Sneaky Pie for President, Rita Mae Brown. … Back to normal today after Aurora shooting pause.

Outside baseball. Ladies of negotiable affection: “The U.S. military said on Wednesday it would not pursue criminal charges against 10 service members implicated in the Secret Service prostitution scandal in Colombia.” Bad apples! Suffered enough! Look forward and not back! … Write your own caption: “Pork belly stuffed with pig brains and a pig’s blood ice cream sundae would have been unthinkable additions to Washington’s staid dining scene 12 years ago.” … Hope, except not: “From a Will.i.am song to the arty [Fairey] ‘Hope’ poster, President Obama’s 2008 campaign capitalized on several pop-culture hits to spread its message. But four years later, images of similar influence have yet to emerge in the 2012 campaign. Grassroots artists — who created countless pieces of media for the 2008 Obama campaign — remain muted for both candidates thus far. ”

Romney. Tax return flap, vetting: “A top campaign official who worked for Sen. John McCain’s (R-Ariz.) 2008 presidential bid and helped select his running mate said Sunday that Mitt Romney’s tax returns ‘do not look anything like the average American,’ but held nothing which prevented him from being on the ticket.‘” … Tax return flap: “5 reasons the Mitt Romney tax controversy won’t go away.” Read it, the shorter: July’s story, Romney’s losing the political class. … Bain flap: Google searches on “Bain” up. In swing states.

* 48 days until the Democratic National Convention ends with a bottles of dry water and dead flies on the floor of the Bank of America Panther Stadium, Charlotte, NC. The lower 48!

Antidote du jour:

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50 comments

  1. dearieme

    “He’s really dopey and just likes to chew socks.”

    Well suited for the office of Vice President then.

  2. dearieme

    “Coe said some of the stories circulating about the way the Olympic and sponsors’ brands are being protected was like the myths about the EU rules on “straight bananas”.”

    But those were no myths – these rules really existed. I once printed them off the EU website.

    1. Goin' South

      At first, I thought these paragraphs must surely be part of some Onion parody:

      “Games boss Sebation Coe warned anyone wearing a Pepsi T-shirt is likely to be booted out because it would upset sponsors Coca-Cola.

      And he only said spectators in Nike trainers “could probably” be allowed in although Adidas are also backing the event.

      Coe defended the draconian move and said it was to protect corporate sponsors who have paid a fortune to be involved.”

      But no, it was a straight news story, demonstrating yet again that there is no limit to the lunacy of Capitalism.

      So what kind of gate checks might patrons be subjected to to protect the following sponsors?

      1) Hanes and Victoria’s Secret;

      2) Clairol;

      3) Tampax;

      4) Viagra.

      Brunner said that Capitalism was “irresponsibility organized into a system.”

      In our day, with the help of trademark and intellectual property laws, it has become insanity disguised as rational self-interest.

      2. JTFaraday

        Yeah, I thought it was an Onion parody too:

        “A cafe manager in London who displayed five bagels in the style of the Olympic rings was ordered to take them down. A butcher in Weymouth, Dorset, also had to take down five rings made from sausages.

        And police have been told to put sandwiches, crisps and chocolate in clear plastic bags to avoid breaking rules on advertising.”

        Brand management control freak.

      1. LeonovaBalletRusse

        LS, UberRepublican Caterpillar a leading 1 percenter since the 1980’s. Bed feathered especially in China. Your “Because” is just. This is the looting way of the Global .01%Masters and their .99%Agents. IMF’s Chicago Shock Doctrine on crystal meth in C.21.

    1. MyLessThanPrimeBeef

      Make that into a Lobbying Index ETF, and let’s see if more 99% will vote for or against it with their money.

        1. ginnie nyc

          Perhaps he meant it will collapse of its own accord: it doesn’t need to be pushed.

          1. Up the Ante

            “Apres moi le deluge?”, yes, a deluge of attempts to figure out why someone on their deathbed would state something like that with ambiguities reigning highest, “apres”.

  9. MyLessThanPrimeBeef

    Is that a male choking dog or a female choking dog?

    They claim most male dogs will not ask for help.

  10. Up the Ante

    http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-07-22/bungled-bank-bailout-leaves-behind-righteous-anger.html

    Go ahead and say it, Neil, the Federal Govt. is a large RICO org.

    Don’t worry, Neil, divinecosmos.com assures us the Marshalls will be arriving soon to ‘Save the Day’!

    “The answer more likely lies with the Justice Department’s lack of sophistication and the timidity that set in ..”
    “.. Dodd-Frank hasn’t solved the problem [, just don’t say it’s my buddies with “the timidity”, k?] ..”

    “.. some at “Treasury are willing to weaken the law [‘Treasury’, k?].”

    “.. Treasury’s [‘Treasury’ agin, k?] triumphant declarations of mission accomplished ..”

    “The missteps by Treasury have produced a valuable byproduct: [Timmy’s foul mouth, ‘You can call them deviates, just don’t call them f#*king deviates!’] ”

    lol

    Thanks for that profound laugh, Neil. Really.

  11. MyLessThanPrimeBeef

    Win- Win.

    Lets hope they can heal China without wounding Austrahlia.

    On the hand, its likely you can not heal the 99.9% without wounding the 0.01%.

    No one can be sure.

    What is certain is the 0.01% have been healing with the 99.9% wounding.

  12. Dave of Maryland

    KS. Water: “Have a long probe — I use a plant stake — and drive it into the ground around your trees and shrubs to be sure they’re watered 12 to 18 inches down.”
    Read more at http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2012/07/links-72312.html#fCitvKTI8r1F71pB.99

    From the Wichita Eagle, a paper I used to know well-enough. Judging by the trees that blow over, most tree roots are at six inches or less. Which is where the water is. Water them a foot down and presuming the tree pays attention and sends roots down that way, you’re setting up a very needy tree.

    Anybody with experience want to comment? I’d say, pile on mulch, keep the ground from drying out.

    2. lidia

      My recent investigations of permaculture have revealed that transplanted trees (i.e. nursery trees) of all kinds suffer from having had their taproot truncated from “birth” (think of this as a kind of more-severe circumcision for trees). The taproot is the plant’s major root which, like a carrot’s, goes straight down to find the water table.

      Once this main root is severed, the remaining root system is that which is more superficial, and subject to uprooting with less effort. The tree can survive, but it is a handicapped being.

  13. Kim Kaufman

    “CA. Top two voting” Pretty much every district in CA has two candidates from the same party who won the “top two” and are now running against in each in November. Many voters disenfranchised — of both parties and especially third party candidates — with this system.

  14. curlydan

    Minimum wage article showed an interesting table: Dividends and Buybacks per employee.

    Wal-Mart and McDonalds, two of the biggest minimum wage employers, spend $8,000 and $7,000, respectively, in dividends and buybacks per employee. Holy Crap!

    That’s rent extraction at its worst.

    1. LucyLulu

      John Stossel recently did a show on Fox about how the minimum wage and interning laws were killing jobs. Business owners were interviewed saying they would hire if they didn’t have to pay minimum wage. With training and benefits, new employees cost them too much. While its understandable that businesses may be needing to watch their budgets closely, why would they think an acceptable solution is to hire employees at less than living wages?

      I recently saw two ads for “interns” on Craig’s List. One was a private company paying less than minimum wage (didn’t say how much) to file and answer phones. Another had a similar position but was a non-profit looking for a student to volunteer their time for free. The first I’m sure was illegal. Not sure about the legality of the second, but what kind of “internship” learning opportunity comes from filing and answering phones? Temp and contractor positions, i.e. no benefits, are the new norm.

      I swore I’d never say this but “what is this world coming to?”

      As Rahm Emmanuel says, “never let a good crisis go to waste”. With a ready supply of desperate workers, the employer sharks have been coming out of the woodwork to enjoy a feeding frenzy.

  16. cwaltz

    This Week with George Stephanoplous as told to The Bobblespeak Translations: “STEPHANOPOULOS: Mayor Bloomberg called for less guns while others have said we need more guns HICKENLOOPER: if he didn’t buy guns he would have gone into that movie theatre and punched or stabbed people.”

    Or I don’t know, he might have blown them up. It isn’t like they didn’t spend the weekend unboobytrapping the guy’s apartment that was rigged to blow up. In this particular instance there is a distinct possibility and evidence that supports this particular guy could have done considerable damage without a gun.

    1. LucyLulu

      True, but most of these mass murderers aren’t PhD students. They don’t have the cognitive capacity to carry out a more complex plan involving explosives, esp. if they suffer from mental illness. Buying a rifle with a clip that holds 100 rounds greatly simplifies the problem of how to kill lots of people in a short amount of time.

  17. Kyrie Eleison

    This was my reply to the Bloomberg Bailout piece, am unsure whether it will make it through moderation but I doubt it:

    Allow me to expand on the casino analogy somewhat, since that’s all this country is nowadays is a huge casino. It would benefit to recognize some of these patterns as they appear in real life and act accordingly:

    The house always wins. To claim otherwise means you’ve never been in a casino.

    Why am I even going to a casino? To “make money”, to be sure. So why don’t I just open my own casino? Well, those guys over there backed up by politicians, lawyers and guns really wouldn’t take too kindly to you cutting in on their action, so you better just shut up and play their game their way.

    Ok, fine. So, the desired rate of return for casinos is now programmed into their central computer which runs all the “games” machines (except for the card tables, but that’s just sharks eating each other up). They are required to pay out only so much of their “take” as “winnings”, and if you think they pay a penny more you are mistaken.

    Enter the players, lulled in by all those flashing lights and digitized harmonics that seem almost trance-inducing. Almost. Add to this the careful layout of the place: Machines that make them the most money are the ones that get the most “action”, and are arranged in a labyrinthine manner to ensure that it is a forest easily entered but difficult to leave. The whole experience is so perfectly engineered that it seems legit.

    Most players are kept at their machines for quite a while, and this is why: You start out with a decent stack of credits. The longer you play, the more credits you lose, but wait a minute: I just “won” a small payout. It’s not enough to get me back to where I started, but it’s progress in the right direction! Positive reinforcement in the form of a modest payout to overcome the long string of small credits expenditures, which strangely do not have the same effect cumulatively because they are spread out over time instead of all in one shot. So, I’ll keep playing for a little while longer… I just “won”, it will happen again.

    A very, very few people manage to get “lucky” and get a significant payout on a machine. They let the bells and whistles hearken “Winner!” to the entire floor. It takes forever for floor personnel to come by and “verify” the winnings and such, for good reason. Everyone else sees or hears about these payouts and thinks: Hey – if I just play the game long enough, that could happen to ME. I’ve been working away at this machine for a while, so that must mean that it’s “warmed up” and ready to payout. After all, my odds of winning are cumulative, not individual for each handle pull, right?

    Wrong. Keep in mind the premise stated at the very beginning. Now that you’ve played yourself out of credits, what’s left to do? Borrow more on credit? That will work for a little while, let’s give that a try. After all, it’s a fair system, and the law of averages has to catch up with me eventually. It’s how the guys who run this casino are able to stay in business, right? Well wait a minute, there was something about central planning and the predetermined ratio of credits spent vs. “winnings” paid … hmm. Now I’m all out of credit for more credits…

    Well now I’m confused. If I didn’t know any better, I’d start to wonder if everyone around here who “wins” is just being subsidized by everyone else who “loses” while the house, who sets all of the rules, makes sure they always get their guaranteed cut…

    I suppose it does not matter now. I’ve lost everything and am in debt for way more than I or my children could possibly repay in our lifetimes. Would they understand when I got home and broke the bad news to them? Am I prepared for that? To anyone who comes across this note, please tell them what happened to me, and that I’m sorry I did not realize what I was doing until it was too late.

  18. JTFaraday

    re: Artisan chocolate and social revolution, Macleans

    “How do we picture a world in which the technological utopia has arrived and the necessities of living are supplied cheaply by intelligent automata? Surely it’s William Morris’s world, a world in which people pursue the making of things that are not mass-produced, specifically for their non-mass-producedness. Things, in short, that reveal the signature of the individual creative mind.”

    Well, that’s one thesis.

    1. lidia

      I get what’s in that sentence. It’s the rest of the piece I take issue with:

      “mass-produced objects necessarily being unlovely junk. We have been to Ikea; we know better.”

      ???

      Ikea furniture is barely tolerable; it is not Lovely. And it is Junk. You can put IKEA’s little plastic gasket along the edge of their kitchen sawdust composite members… guess what? They soon take on water from spills and floor-cleaning and deform anyway.

      That said, the Mast Bros. model only works when one has a rich clientele to support the enterprise.

      “Lovely” things are borne of surplus. That surplus can be a shared, commonly-expressed surplus (as in the case of many non-industrial cultures) or a surplus dedicated to the satisfaction of elites and elite tastes and fads (as is the case with the Mast Bros. and our current social decline and inequality). What kid in Brooklyn can actually afford an $8 chocolate bar?

      I admire their dedication, but really such scruples would make better sense in the supply of cereals, meat or vegetables to a populace which is essentially being starved of nutrients by conventional agriculture, rather than plying their talents for authenticity only amongst the most inessential and high-profit marginal goods.

    1. Up the Ante

      I don’t mean to minimize the lead patching significance, but the steam nuclide measurings not being honestly reported is more important.

      TEPCO said Reactor 2 released the most radiation but did not explain how they came to that conclusion. 2 never exploded but did visibly steam the most. With those boom cranes we’re to believe nuclide analysis was not deemed crucial and possible ??

    2. Up the Ante

      Steam

      “They say the amount of the radioactivity leaked from the No. 2 reactor was 10 to 20 times higher than other reactors, following their hydrogen explosions. ”

      TEPCO says 10 to 20 times the gas was contained by Reactor 2 in comparison to the three reactors that exploded, yet #2 did not explode, that 10 to 20 was from popping open a valve.

      “These rises came 1 hour after each time workers at the No. 2 reactor released steam from the core to lower its pressure. ”

      6 miles south these valve openings produced spikes in radiation levels, yet #2 steamed visibly the most for months on the webcam and no mention by TEPCO of THAT effect.

      http://www3.nhk.or.jp/daily/english/20120724_26.html

      half-nutted corporate psyops

    1. spooz

      Or is ZH too fringe? Some people appreciate their work on HFT and flash crashes, regardles of their Mises bias. At least those of us whose still intact critical thinking skills allows them to filter through the propaganda.

    2. Up the Ante

      “… is it because I said Whalen was preaching for bankster rule? ”

      lol

      They wouldn’t do that, would they ?

      lol

  22. Glenn Condell

    If you are looking for one more reason to justify hanging bankers, you can’t go past Tony Blair’s opinion that we shouldn’t.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/tony-blair/9422096/Tony-Blair-hanging-bankers-wont-help.html

    I wonder how much he extracted from JPM and the others for this latest service, or maybe he judged it prudent to provide it gratis in his masters’ hour of need. If so it’s almost Churchillian of him. (Except for that tan, he will have to stop yachting with Silvio. And Jamie. And Bono.)

    Visit Australia Tony, so I can chuck my Doc Martens at that traitorous dial of yours. Maybe Westpac or NAB can organise a lucrative speaking tour, or perhaps we can organise for Qld to occupy part of NSW so that you can come over and pretend to help out.

    1. FaustCarton

      Well said old truther, but don’t dishonour the Docs, just hoiking one of your
      flip-flop thongs at treacherous tyrants is the go don’t you know?

      1. Glenn Condell

        Do flip-flops come in hobnails?

        Good to see you’re about. The missus says hello, give us a bell when you’re next in these parts. Hope plenty of fence mending has put you in the black.

  23. Json Nor

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