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Surviving the Death of the Universe: A neat extreme futurist piece considers the last days of the universe: So on some day in the far future, the last star will cease to shine, and the universe will be littered with nuclear debris, dead neutron stars and black holes. Intelligent civilisations, like homeless people in rags huddled next to dying campfires, will gather around the last flickering embers of black holes emitting a faint Hawking radiation Escape from Universe of Dirty Tricks
The political universe is out of control, in a runaway acceleration Why has the unpopular Michael Egan suddenly resigned as NSW Treasurer, to be replaced by the affable Andrew Refshauge?

Eye on Politics & Law Lords: History will Judge Us Kindly?
Torture thrives when those who make the policy are convinced that they possess a moral superiority that should not be constrained by regulation. From Argentina to Iran and Central America, Isabel Hilton excavates the logic as well as the gruesome precedents of America’s moral collapse at Abu Ghraib

As Iraq gears up for elections on 30 January, torture of Iraqis by Coalition troops hits the headlines again. In the USA the first contested trial over the abuse of prisoners at Abu Ghraib results in a ten-year sentence for US Army specialist Charles Graner. Meanwhile in Germany, at a trial of British servicemen, photographs are shown apparently revealing another torture scandal in Iraq. How could such things be allowed to happen? Is this the work of 'a few bad apples' or evidence of a policy? What can we do?
At times like this we need cool analysis, reasoned argument and a sense of perspective. We want to remind you that openDemocracy has provided in-depth coverage of the Abu Ghraib scandal and the larger issues of torture in our debate 'After Image: the meanings of Abu Ghraib'.

• Torture: who gives the orders [Arab Mirror; After image: the meanings of Abu Ghraib ]
• · Young Labor does one function - it teaches people how to hate other members of the Labor Party: Nick Grimm spoke to Rodney Cavalier, a former New South Wales education minister, who these days is a Labor Party historian and commentator: Well, what we're witnessing is something seriously bad in the history of any political party, and that's an intersection of the collapse of belief and the collapse in organisation. But as belief has disappeared as a crucible, careers and jobs and the prospects of the glittering lights have replaced them. And so people are lining up in terms of where they nail their colours to the mast – not in terms of what they believe, but in terms of what opportunities they perceive will fall their way, in terms of what faction they join. Labor leadership outcome remains uncertain; History will be kind to me for I intend to write it: In 2006 New South Wales will celebrate 150 years of irresponsible government]
• · · Peggy Noonan, Wall Street Journal Liberty Bell Ringer: A Case of Mission Inebriation? ; [ Five steps for defeating terrorism ]
• · · · Saad Eddin Ibrahim, Jerusalem Post Saudi Arabia's 'Democracy'; [From Saudi Arabia, Islamic pilgrims bring cosmopolitan air to unlikely city Mecca: The Cultural Capital of Islam]
• · · · · Best and Worst Inaugural Speeches An interesting feature in the Post today rates the best and worst Presidential inaugural speeches of all time. Inaugural: High and low of Gural Dance ; President Bush's speech was impressive, and also frightening to those who suspect that he really meant it. Imperial Roman: No Country Left Behind; No Barbarian Left Behind; [Whether by amending the language regarding covert action or by adopting new language specifically tailored to special forces, Congress should ensure that covert military operations be held to at least the same standard of accountability as the CIA's covert actions. The risks inherent in the types of missions that the Pentagon envisions for its special forces are at least as serious as those arising from the CIA covert operations that prompted the restrictions now in place. The rules, therefore, should be just as strict. The Rise and Rise of Shadow Barbarians and Warriors ]
• · · · · · David Marr with Aban Contractor and Tony Stephens: The extraordinary public assault on Latham by Bob Carr, Queensland's Peter Beattie and the WA premier's proxy, Attorney-General Jim McGinty, was mounted knowing Latham had made up his mind to leave - sometime. They were using the media to pressure him to do what he had already decided to do, but do it quickly ; Premier Bob Carr has ordered his new cabinet to become proactive in solving problems with the public in a major push to bounce back in the opinion polls; [History of Us ]

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Jozef Banas supplied information to the secret police on the movements of foreign journalists when he was employed in the press division of the foreign ministry. MP for the ruling SDKU party Jozef Banas was unhappy with the decision of the Memory of the Nation Institute to publish the files.
Last week a Slovakian secretary of state, Jan Hurny, a member of the same party, resigned following allegations about his past as an StB agent. Jozef Banas is to address a parliamentary session this week with respect to his listing on the Stb files. While in Poland Jozef Oleksy resigned after being found guilty of lying about collaborating with Communist secret services Blood Sucking Fleas

A western Sydney schoolboy has received a back-to-school cheque addressed to "Mrs Passed Away", 15 months after his mother died. I'm not in a position to make a personal apology because it wasn't an envelope that I addressed. Fair go Bob Carr Ministry has Business and AAA on Side

Eye on Politics & Law Lords: Gillard, Rudd canvass colleagues
A Three-Horse race for Labor's federal leadership seems likely. As we all know, a week is a long time in politics ... Labor faces an excruciating dilemma. It is running scared, scarred from its experiment with generational change and paying the price for a decade or more of not replenishing its talent pool. It has reached the point where only a handful of caucus members have any employment experience outside politics or the union movement It is a party with few choices and those that it has are flawed

KIM Beazley is holding on to the votes of many of the caucus members who backed him at his last failed leadership attempt, but support was last night building for Kevin Rudd.
The former opposition leader flew to Sydney yesterday to continue lobbying for votes, breaking with his tactics of 2003 by calling caucus colleagues directly rather than relying on close factional allies to do the work for him.
But while he remains the frontrunner, the race is tightening, with Mr Rudd's supporters last night claiming they already had about 30 of the 44 caucus votes he would need to scrape through and win.

I wouldn't have blamed him for either, or both, of two highly personal reactions: psychic depression, or Get Stuffed. As the leader of the Labor Party, Mark Latham can't afford either. He has to summon his courage and grit out the next three, and possibly six, years. It will be the toughest time of his life: tougher than his testicular cancer, tougher than pancreatitis, tougher than losing the 2004 election. Whatever, Latham was the victim
• Numbers All Over The Floor [Google links to leadership challengers; Gillard is game as contest gets ugly; The Australian federal election of 2004 is a long way distant from the 1840s of Karl Marx, but his arguments still resonate. Many in the Labor Party and on the Left have blamed the 'selfishness' of families with mortgages who overwhelmingly voted for the Coalition and who supported John Howard because they believed that the Coalition was more likely than the ALP to keep interest rates lower
The collapse of communism and the failure of socialist states around the world revealed the Left's vision to be unattainable ]
• · Bush begins 2nd term today amid stiff security; Bush Avoids Iraq in Inaugural Speech George Bush aka Orwell launches term with vow to spread freedom; [ The anchor of King's dream; The anchor of Economic dream]
• · · The Pentagon has hit back at claims by investigative reporter Seymour Hersh that US commandos have been carrying out covert operations inside Iran. There is plausible deniability - of course they [the Bush administration] don't want it known- Seymour Hersh Intelligence coup: Until the Government Denies it; [Being a 007 can be glamorous and boring all in the same day As a city police officer, never try to arrest the mayor; A political artist on trial A professor facing possible charges of bio-terrorism speaks in Toronto]
• · · · This blogger holds many bitterweet memories of the Czechoslovak army: Compulsory military service was introduced by Emperor Franz Jozef in 1868 when the Czech lands were part of Austria-Hungary The last conscripts have left the Czech army ; There is never a shortage of idiots, but, War and Principal Vidmar takes the cake! Idiot of the Year
• · · · · CNN.com - Wave of suicide blasts kills at least 25
• · · · · · The identity of Australians could be subjected to unprecedented scrutiny under the biggest security protection plan since the failed Australia Card; Authorities are scouring Boston for four Chinese nationals and two Iraqi men who may pose a nuclear threat to the city Two Iraqi; via Czech Amerikan: Four Chinese nationals sought in terror probe
[I am going to be sleeping in my bed in Massachusetts tonight and I feel perfectly safe doing so
-Mitt Romney; Massachusetts governor]

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There is only one way to achieve happiness on this terrestrial ball,
And that is to have either a clear conscience, or none at all.
-A thought from the poet Ogden Nash (from “Interoffice Memorandum in I’m a Stranger Here Myself).
When Did James Cumes write this article on Investment: three years after my escape? or 25 years after the escape?
James wrote it three years after the altenative party was born: Green Party the visible quarter of the century

Invisible Hands & Markets: Open minds lead to open doors
The expansion of the traditional recruiter's role is drawing people from a wider variety of fields

Competition has been fierce in the recruitment game over the past few years and firms have been trying various strategies to lift their profile and win new business.
Many firms have branched into - or expanded - HR consulting, outplacement and career development arms so that they offer "talent management" rather than simply the sourcing and matching of candidates to vacancies.
As a result, many recruitment consultants are now doing more consulting and less recruitment.

• drive, determination, discipline, dedication and passion [Starving the Beast: The Psychology of Budget Deficits]
• · There is an on-going debate about tax competition or tax harmonization. The high-tax welfare states want to keep tax rates high so that they can continue to fund their social welfare programs. But they are losing business and investments to lower tax jurisdictions Is Tax Competition Harmful? ; Treasury, OECD Officials Discuss International Tax Developments (via Tax Professor)
• · · Conscience is the inner voice that tells us that someone is looking. H.L. Mencken: Bunk. For one thing, that statement suggests that there is less disparity with mandatory guidelines. That's simply not true. There are huge disparities under the present system. When Congress plays judge
• · · · Savvy Tax Policy Advisors Needed: APS6 and EL1 several jobs in Canberra - call Paul McCullough on 02 6263 3820 apply by close of business 27 January 2005
• · · · · Nicholas Confessore, NY Times Magazine Bush's Breaking of the Tax Code ; [John Nance Garner is best remembered for his assessment of the vice presidency. The office, he reportedly sneered in 1932, isn't worth a pitcher of warm spit. The quote may be apocryphal, and even credulous historians think he referenced a different bodily fluid. History of Life’s 100% Certainty ]
• · · · · · If you want to know what God thinks of money, just look at the people he gave it to. Dorothy Parker Penguin loses the plot

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Life is a great mystery. Is everybody a different person when they are with somebody else?
Louise Fitzhugh, Harriet the Spy

The Moment of Escape: Just One Single Moment Can Change Everything
Everything we see and our brains themselves would just be parts of this simulation.’ Oxford University philosopher Dr Nick Bostrom echoes the thoughts of sci-fi writers and scientists alike. The simulation hypothesis is not sci-fi, it’s serious academic thought. Ach, Are We Real?
Despite various reservations, the following question seems to be in order: How likely are you to read Cold River, based on a real story, this year? Will you be a different person after you read it? If in fact by the end of the year, you find yourself ordering the story of Iron Curtain crossing, you might be able to shift some of the blame onto us. It seems that the simple and apparently mundane act of asking a question can lead to a very intentional response by the respondents or consumers.



By chance or good fortune, Cold River's 15 Minutes @ Digital Palm Reading keeps on Ticking
[ Number of people, mostly in their twenties, who attempt suicide in the world each year: 10 to 20 million; number who actually succeed: about 1 million --- Number of people who attempt to get published in the world each year: 100 to 200 million; number who actually succeed: about 10 million ...
-Source John Croucher, Professor of Statistics; and Media Dragon, Professor of Number Crunching]
Believe it or not - our other book - Sex at the Gate is selling like hot cakes: There is No Discount Like Double Dragon Discount: Dirty Thirty %

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Senior opposition leaders have called for the resignation of Police President Jiri Kolar [Party Affiliation: Member of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, 1982-89] so many times in the last three years that most political observers have lost count. Bugging is not the problem of the Czech police alone but of the police forces in all post-communist countries including NSW (smile) So now you understand that the average person would object to being wiretapped? In this country, the order to wiretap a person is issued by a judge, and only in the most serious of criminal cases...

Eye on Politics & Law Lords: How to win at Politics
Jonathan Jones has written a book on art and politics entitled: In Machiavelli's Florence. For 500 years his name has been synonymous with ruthlessness, manipulation and backstabbing. But could the much-maligned Machiavelli tell us the truth about politics in our time? Jonathan Jones on why Brown and Blair have much to learn from a 16th-century thinker

The 16th-century political thinker Niccolò Machiavelli knew how to get rid of a troublesome minister, even a chancellor. Modern leaders fret and fuss and fall out. They make promises and break them and time their speeches to upstage one another. Really, it's all so lily-livered. In Machiavelli's Florence, Tony Blair would have had Gordon Brown quietly poisoned by now, and if not, he himself would be food for eels in the river Arno.

For him, the feud between Blair and Brown would not have been a thing of shame and embarrassment. It would satisfy him like a bleeding slab of Tuscan steak. This is it, he might tell the Labour MPs frightened for their futures; this is the life you chose. Try to relish it, washed down with a nice glass of chianti. As for what Brown said to Blair - what a prude it exposes Brown to be. The chancellor is reported to have told the prime minister that there is nothing Blair could ever say now he will believe. Is this supposed to be criticism, Machiavelli might ask? Because a true politician would savour it as praise.
• Classic political manual The Prince ; [Anthony Sampson's second survey of the British establishment, Who Runs This Place?, finds little that has changed for the better Down the corridors of power ... Who Runs This Place?]
• · Och, Yech: Out of ancient disasters, forebears may have colonised new lands Tsunami survival tales hint how our ancestors crossed the sea
• · · Tony Mauro, USA Today SCOTUS: Serving 25 Years or More is Too Long; [Peggy Noonan, Wall Street Journal: After the Dan Rather scandal, American journalism will never be the same. MSM Requiem - ]
• · · · The U.N. needs a good smack in the face, says New York City Councilmember Simcha Felder. Relationship between the UN and New York City; [Root Causes: An Interview with Wangari Maathai The recent Nobel Peace Prize winner talks about sowing the seeds of democracy in Kenya]
• · · · · Nazi Germany established its collaboration government in Vichy France and recruited French politicians, soldiers and police to administer a truncated and compliant state... When plasma is in short supply, the opportunist buys and sells blood. When food is scarce, he hordes food and gouges the hungry ... the journalists who sell their professionalism for prestige, access to power and job security; the academics and scientists who prostitute themselves for large corporations so that polluters may pollute or that neighborhoods may be paved and people and animals may have the last dime of profit squeezed out of them. But the gladiator collaborator is still not the foundation of empire. That distinction belongs to the sixth degree of collaboration, the merely compliant. Us. All of us. No empire can exist without collaborators: Six Degrees of Collaboration; [In the latest of a string of gaffes, dysfunctional Harry, 20, wore a red and black swastika armband and an army shirt with Nazi regalia at the party at a friend's house on Saturday. He has been allowed to get away with murder. Prince Harry wears Nazi swastika ; Google links to Potty Harry stories in the Nazi Uniform ]
• · · · · · Shock at the Asia disaster. Tears shed in grief and joy. Relief for the survivors. When the tsunamis hit, around 800 Czech citizens reportedly were staying in Sri Lanka, 300 were staying in Thailand and a handful, including legendary singer Karel Gott Tsunami and Bohemian Gott

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You go to spin alley, the place called spin alley. Now, don't you think that, for people watching at home, that's kind of a drag, that you're literally walking to a place called deception lane?
- Comedian Jon Stewart on CNN's Crossfire with hosts Tucker Carlson and Paul Begala, Oct. 15, 2004.
Lisa Stone traces the origins of spin and the history of how journalists have dealt with it. Lisa describes how the web are changing the fabric of journalism Not a stone left unturned: History of Spinmeisters

The Blog, The Press, The Media: A Cover-Up Is a Cover-Up

Like other powerful institutions confronted by scandal, CBS News is still fighting real reform. And still refusing to admit they have a problem.

LARGE AND POWERFUL INSTITUTIONS do not react well to internal scandal, especially when that scandal threatens to erode a central pillar of the institution's authority. The first reaction will almost inevitably be denial, followed by various efforts to isolate and minimize the scandal, to protect leadership, and then to adopt only such "reforms" as are forced upon it. Genuine accountability and reform typically only accompany a crash so spectacular that no one can persist in the cover-up.

It is impossible to count the number of times I thought about writing something along these lines. The scandal of Abu Ghraib is therefore a sign of both freedom's endurance in America and also, in certain dark corners, its demise. The facts you find out first, the images that are initially imprinted on your consciousness, the details that then follow
• Scandals: what's the difference between Bernard Francis Cardinal Law and Dan Rather? [Let’s Blame the Readers Is it possible to do great journalism if the public does not care? ]
• · Blogs are strongest when they are politically diverse, when they are committed to insurgency rather than power, when they belong to no party. I'm particularly worried that the blogosphere has become far more knee-jerk, shrill and partisan since the days when I first started blogging. Some of that's healthy and inevitable; but too much is damaging. In challenging the Main Strem Media, MSM, we should resist the temptation to become like them
• · · Blogs are better, supporters write, because, among other things, they are transparent. No hidden agendas, not hidden biases. Everything is out in the open Well, not really ; [Justices hear arguments about anonymous speech on the real Bunyips of the Web The John Doe has fought to remain anonymous, arguing that releasing his or her identity would be a breach of the right to privacy and anonymity ; [Do I know how my son Tom feels? I do not. Only five million people on the internet know how my son Tom feels. Barrista’s Wishing Well ]
• · · · GM's vice chairman now has a blog ; [I told you so Being interrupted by an email can make stressed workers more productive ; Your Call (and Rants on Hold) Will Be Monitored]
• · · · · Joi Ito provides a selection of clippings from a Good article in BusinessWeek about the future of the New York Times. (Requires registration.) The Times is facing a crisis ; [I like the latest suspect who is about to fly in the shoes of the naughty legal eagles David Marr (size 10), Stuart Littlemore (size 11) and Richard Ackland (size 9 1/2) Media Watch shoes close to being taken Liz Jackson (size 8?)]
• · · · · · As the electronic services librarian at SUNY Cortland, Karen A. Coombs shares her expertise Using Web Server Logs to Track Users Through the Electronic Forest; [Media Bloggers Association - Legal Defense Fund ]

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An Australian Artist and an International Hunger Fighter James Cumes Blogs about A Silver Lining
Another Matter of History: Why do our leaders seem so small compared with the World War II generation?

The Prime Minister, John Howard, today pledged $1 billion over five years to the Indonesia's tsunami reconstruction, the largest donation made so far for the relief effort. Howard promises $1 billion in aid
Flashbacks, survivor guilt, grief and fear will dog millions of survivors of the tsunami, with some experts warning these problems could prove harder to resolve than the physical damage...
Survivor Guilt is the worst of all

Eye on Politics & Law Lords: Tremors point to a frightening future
However isolated they may seem, earthquakes may be closely linked

Like two bookends of calamity, earthquakes at Bam in Iran and off Sumatra in Indonesia have delineated a year of unusual seismic ferocity - a year, one might say, of living dangerously.
Twelve months, almost to the very hour, before Boxing Day's extraordinary release of stress at the India-Burma tectonic plate boundary, a similar jolt at the boundary of the Arabian and Eurasian plates devastated one of the most celebrated of Persian caravan cities.

• Tsunami Ripples [An Indonesian tsunami survivor rescued after five days at sea has another reason to celebrate She'll have her first baby in less than six months ; Natural disasters bring out the best philanthropic instincts in the human soul. Unfortunately they also seem to bring out the most insufferable theological drivel from the human brain. If we have reason to doubt the point of our existence in this world, surely we would understand it even less in that one]
• · Thomas Friedman Only Iraqis Can Liberate Themselves ; Two True Pictures of the Terror War
• · · Tim Dunlop has a knack for stories with legs, a large number of legs enters the trickiest topics of all: Insurgency lotto numbers in Iraq; [Bush Fuses Orwell, Kafka ]
• · · · Miracle of survival can't take away suffering of a family ripped apart
• · · · · Putin Demotes Adviser Critical of the Kremlin; [What the hell is going on? Is spectrum of workers revolution invading the world. Vladimir Ilyich Lenin Ulyanov rather than John Lennon stare at me from every magazine my oldest daughter opens courtesy of the Big Pond Music ads for Telstra. There's a whole phenomenon going on with Che Guevara that's really difficult to explain. You have kids -- who don't even know who Che Guevara is, wearing his clothes. Che Guevara to Cubans is a murderer. The revolutionary medicine preached by Che Guevara is growing and 2017 is coming near you; Secret file gets to the bottom of toilet paper The Loo paper campaign, which would be at home in an episode of the comedy Yes Minister
• · · · · · A Chilean judge is investigating 10 secret police who worked under the former dictator Augusto Pinochet on a disinformation scheme Sydney court scene in 2008? ; Just amazing what the atrocious bloggers find: Harassing, Annoying, & 'Bad Guy' Identifying Chemicals

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Is more "freedom of choice" for workers good or bad for unions? A midlife `divorce' for labor?
Over the past 50 years, we've been having a big debate over two rival economic systems. Conservatives have tended to favor the American model, with smaller government and lower taxes, but less social support. Liberals have supported programs that lead to the European model, with bigger government, more generous support and less inequality A Tale of 2 Orwellian Systems

Invisible Hands & Markets: Buy Asian: Intimate outsiders with Invisible Hands
As a Starbucks-aholic, I must admit that when I think "Sumatra" I think coffee. But I honestly have no idea if Starbucks' Sumatra blend actually does come from Sumatra, and if much (or any) of the money I give them each morning ends up there. N.Z. Bear has a good idea: let's help the tsunami victims by bolstering their economy...

Last week, the UN Undersecretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs Jan Egeland caused a mini-storm by saying that Western governments are stingy when it comes to foreign aid.
Broadly speaking, foreign aid can be divided into two categories: emergency relief similar to the aid being rushed to the Asian tsunami victims, and longer-term development projects.
Aid is only a part of the development picture...
The true insignificance of aid is revealed by the fact that trade contributes almost $US1.7 trillion to the developing world, making free trade an imperative – hence the emergence of the slogan "trade, not aid".

• Don D'Cruz: Free trade more precious than foreign aid [Buy South Asian! ]
• · It is Official: Women don't like to work; [Do Tourists Come to Us Mainly for the Cheap Beer?" Stags and Hens in Prague]
• · · What's really amazing about the Long Tail is the sheer size of it. Combine enough nonhits on the Long Tail and you've got a market bigger than the hits. Take books: The average Barnes & Noble carries 130,000 titles. Yet more than half of Amazon's book sales come from outside its top 130,000 titles. Consider the implication: If the Amazon statistics are any guide, the market for books that are not even sold in the average bookstore is larger than the market for those that are. Capitalism without Capital ; [Death and Taxes: A Visual Look at Where Your (U.S.) Tax Dollars Go ]
• · · · In America, we rarely declare "victory" over a problem. Once an issue becomes a target of collective concern, it stays on the political landscape, even if substantial progress occurs. Congressional committees, interest groups, government agencies and journalists all acquire a stake in "attacking" the problem... Millions of young Americans are too footloose to want a home. Some old Americans are too feeble to handle a home All this serves as useful background to the controversy surrounding Fannie Mae, the nation's largest mortgage company; [ Why tougher laws won't make corporates more responsible]
• · · · · This is an edited version of a paper published by Observatory Pascal in May 2004 Social capital: Do we understand it?
• · · · · · I do not believe that people are capable of rational thought when it comes to making decisions in their own lives

Google Ranking while Helping Tsunami Victims
International aid organizations:
UNICEF (United Nations Children's Fund)
United Nations' World Food Programme
Medecins Sans Frontieres / Doctors without Borders (donate!)
CARE International
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies

UK/Europe:
Disasters Emergency Comittee (DEC) - comprises a raft of aid agencies, including the below and others
British Red Cross
Save the Children UK

North America:
American Red Cross
Canadian Red Cross
Save The Children

Anders Jacobsen: Webloggers: Give to tsunami victims and I'll give too!

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It snowed in Dubai recently. Antarctica is at its warmest in 10,000 years. The tsunami has changed the atlas. The world as we knew it is becoming history. Geography is being redefined. As are climatology, anthropology and even space. World lost, world gained

Invisible Hands & Markets: Monstrous Irony
Daniel Bell reminded us of a basic truth: The battle over culture is far more complex than most conservatives acknowledge and far more enduring than most liberals admit. The modern hubris is the refusal to accept limits. The modern world proposes a destiny that is always beyond: beyond morality, beyond tragedy, beyond culture.

It was Karl Marx who made the observation that history repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce. What, one wonders, would old Karl have made of the obscenity that is now the North of Ireland in this, the 10th year of the ceasefires as the media and the three governments struggle and squirm not to say what everyone suspects and knows within their hearts: which is that the Provisional IRA was behind the pre-Christmas robbery at the Northern Bank in Belfast.

• And Karl Marx might also say to himself, S***, I have been here before! [It's hard to imagine that just 200 years ago, the vast majority of human beings -- more than three-quarters of all people alive -- lived under some form of slavery. Bury the Chains ]
• · We aim for a touch of realism in our editorial page wishes this time around ... So we won't wish for an end to all poverty and all wars ... Bye bye Amazon, hello Barnes and Noble
• · · The Bush administration has made some promising noises about reducing domestic spending in the last couple of months In Plan to Reduce Deficit, White House Turns to Old Projections
• · · · High prices on raw materials Anita Campbell has written several posts on 2005 trend predictions ; [After a long career in the liquor business, Sidney Frank has turned to giving away his fortune, making a $100 million gift to Brown University, the largest in its history Absinthe to Vodka: The Seller of the Goose That Laid a Golden Egg ]
• · · · · Are we allowing life to be the sum of tasks, the short term always the priority? Are we so connected that we're actually disconnected? Are humans designed to cope with the always-on, just-in-time, emailus interruptus 21st century?
• · · · · · It will surely go down as a monstrous irony that it took what is very possibly the worst tsunami in modern recorded history to truly conjure up a global media village that banners Asia What possible good could come out of this terrible tsunami?

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How many pairs of ribs do you have? Go on, count them. Most of you will be able to count twelve pairs but one in ten of you will have an extra pair. It's the result of a mutation in the genetic coding when, as embryos, our vertebrae are formed. Similar mutations might've caused you to have been born without thymus or thyroid glands or missing parts of your hindbrains or cranial nerves or with abnormal heart or facial stuctures. Equally, it is thanks to such mutations that we have evolved into who we are. Indeed, without such genetic mutations we would still be a thin film of slime covering the surface of a pond somewhere. Freak show...? If I was a woman I would have four breasts

Invisible Hands & Markets: How To Inspire Your Freak Team
Charlie Feld talks about trust, hope, enjoyment, and opportunity. As a leader, you have the power to influence people and therefore their performance. If you believe in creating an environment where trust, optimism, enjoyment and personal growth are encouraged, then you will build a sustainable, high-performing team—and, in the process, create many new leaders.

In the Ring of Gyges fable from Plato's The Republic, the philosopher poses this question: If a ring could make you invisible, would you steal, cheat or even murder? Or would you always do the right thing even though no one would know? Those who answer yes to the first question believe that people are inherently corrupt or lazy, and the only thing that keeps civilizations together are laws, rewards and punishments. Then there are people who believe in the basic goodness and industriousness of individuals; to them, people will always do the right thing when given a choice. From that dichotomy springs different management systems and environments in the workplace. One is full of rules; the other isn't...

• A high-performance staff needs your trust, optimism and encouragement [Honestly, in the blogosphere, responding to criticism quickly with honesty turns any criticism into a positive. Do you really lose your creativity at the age of four?]
• · The living room, once the most technologically simple part of the average home, is a high-tech battleground today as the consumer electronics industry seeks to digitize home entertainment and make it available anywhere, anytime 2005: Living Room Battles ; [If lots of foreigners continue to exit the dollar, and leave the market, we'll have chaos as they won't get through the door. Grimacing our way ]
• · · Tax returns suspected as strange illness hits workers; [This self-parody would be easy to laugh off if it did not represent the apotheosis of free market idolatry, idolatry that is worshipped at the highest levels of our government. The folks at Ayn Rand don’t believe in taxation ]
• · · · Why you can eat a tasty 'roo burger at the Strangers Dining Room @ NSW Parliament: Unlike sheep kangaroos are not herd animals that will docilely obey one shepherd and a dog
• · · · · Where Saudi oil money goes — The New York Times admits there's an international problem: The Saudi government, itself The Saudi Syndrome
• · · · · · IMac Rumor May Accelerate Apple's 'Halo Effect' ; [For the first time, Americans' use of credit cards, debit cards and other electronic bill paying has eclipsed paper checks. Digital payments surpass paper czechs ]

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Gay movie star Rupert Everett wants Sir Elton John to give up his newest pastime: slagging other celebs, especially Rupert’s pal Madonna. Everett says, “I think Elton has lost it completely. He loves to tell you how he overcame addictions - drugs, bulimia... He did not overcome addictions. He went from one to another. All these shopping sprees, and not controlling his mouth.”
[Sir Elton was married at St Marks Darling Point a place were Imrich angels are christened and many wild men of Sydney are buried ...]
Rupert Hits Out At Elton New Addiction

Literature & Art Across Frontiers: Good Idea, Bad Execution
In brilliant festivals and noisy entertainments, there is always, at bottom, a sense of emptiness prevalent. A false tone is there: such gatherings are in strange contrast with the misery and barrenness of our existence.
-Schopenhauer

That's life. You get old, then you die. In between hopefully you had a laugh, had a cry, heard a good story, told one, had a friend, was a friend, took a walk, read a book, invented something, thanked someone for something, remembered someone you loved and eventually -- was remembered by someone who loved you.
I tell my friends that I feel lucky, I've lived to see what life was like after my own death. Really. Every day is like that. It's really a blessing, because it's easy to shed the angst that accumulates by living. "I'm just a ghost," I think to myself. That adds a special quality to life.

• Dave Winer of Scripting news flame [ Jump Start on Those New Year's Resolutions ]
• · This business of living is so hard -- and so fascinating On a New Year: Imagining, Creating a Life
• · · Writer Rich Cohen In the seventh month of pregnancy, Jessica and I attended one of those classes where they teach you how to have a baby, how to count and how to breathe. We had to go around the room and in the manner of Alcoholics Anonymous each give our name and say something about ourselves. I said, "Hello, my name is Richard, and my wife, Jessica, is having a baby." Birth Center Antinatal classes @ Royal Women Hospital Paddington 1990 ; [What our study has revealed is that there isn't just a gender divide in the world, there's also a divide between men who are dads and men who aren't Us & ‘Em ]
• · · · We're clocking in with almost 500 lists this year List of Lists
• · · · · At new year in ancient Babylon, towering statues of the gods were collected from the city's many temples, loaded on to boats and conveyed with great pomp up the canals to the ziggurat of Esagila. The ancient new year festivals celebrated the pain and struggle of creativity, but they also expressed a conviction that it was possible to make a fresh start, provided that we do not succumb to the temptations of denial. Our Leaders Could Do with a Dose of Ritual Humiliation
• · · · · · The events of the past week tend to bear out the proposition advanced by these great thinkers - we do have a deep streak of generosity within our natures. But that impulse is not, on its own, enough. It must become an on-going part of our lives, a commitment permanent enough to sustain those who will continue suffering long after the media has turned its attention elsewhere

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Nothing worth doing is completed in our lifetime,
Therefore, we are saved by hope.
Nothing true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history;
Therefore, we are saved by faith.
Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone.
Therefore, we are saved by love.
No virtuous act is quite a virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as from our own;
Therefore, we are saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness
-Reinhold Niebuhr
New Year begins as world mourns with knots in our stomach ... Satellite photo showing the tsunami

Eye on Politics & Law Lords: Titov Tremors of Doubt and Science: Second wave of horror in diseases
The political and ideological exploitation of perhaps the worst natural disaster in all our lifetimes is almost beyond belief , were it not for the fact that nothing these days is beyond belief.

It was a catastrophe that reminded us of our fragile existence, and of our humanity.
The most immediate danger is of water-borne disease, particularly the forms of gastroenteritis that strike when water supplies are corrupted. These include bacterial, viral and parasitic diseases, from cholera and shigellosis to E.coli infections and giardiasis.
Most of the bugs were already in the areas and likely to spread like wildfire...

People worldwide have jammed phone lines and websites today to give millions of dollars to the victims of Asia's tsunamis, outpacing their own governments in their generosity. Huge response to tsunami appeal Charity that begins at home does not have to end there. The horror of the tsunami drowns optimistic new year thoughts. Images of human flotsam and jetsam prompt nihilistic thoughts of meaninglessness. (If only there was a God to blame ...) Tsunamis may be inevitable; human failure to minimise suffering is not
• Race against time as toll nears 150,000 [ The earth shook, the sea rose up ]
• · Boris Johnson: on when it is time to admit gracefully that our number is up The forces of nature are upredicable
• · · A new age of barbarism is upon us ... Administration's legal counsels have been turned into the sort of cynical corporate lawyers who figure out how to make something illegal seem kosher - or at least how to minimize the danger of being held to account. Geneva Conventions and Abu Ghraib
• · · · Onlookers spread word that a senior official had abused a helpless porter. China's 'Haves' Stir the 'Have Nots' to Violence [How many different ways have I been warned not to rock the boat ... Let me count the ways]
William Gladstone observed: We look forward to the time when the Power of Love will replace the Love of Power. Then will our world know the blessings of peace...
• · · · · I tried to persuade him ... after the Darwin cyclone not to resume his interupted overseas visit. He looked at me in the eye and said: Comrade if I am going to put up with the f***wits in the Labour Party, I have got to have my trips by John Menadue on his former boss, Gough Whitlam. Treasury enlisted the help of Scotland Yard to try to torpedo secret negotiations by the Whitlam government for a $4 billion loan
Do? Do! All these people who say we have to do this and do that. What we have to do is make sure the trains are working for people, make sure there's a hospital bed when they're sick and there's a school desk for their kids. What you do in NSW isn't visionary, it's necessary.
- Graham Richardson, former ALP senator, March 2000
Having wished our leaders all the best, New Year's Day is also a time of resolution and good intentions and it is important we not eschew tradition. Here is a wish list to Carr, Brogden and their respective teams. Heartfelt thanks to a host of diverse thinkers and helpers, from former Fraser minister Fred Chaney and former state Labor MP Paul O'Grady, to Gary Moore, the director of the NSW Council of Social Service, and the medico and social activist Professor Ian Webster. The intriguing and clearly well connected - if anonymous - crikey.com.au political columnist, "Boilermaker Bill McKell", deserves a particular thanks for his/her thoughts and online conversations with me, too... Just the time to show some resolution By Paola Totaro