Mood:  chatty

This is not a well packaged story. It’s a contemporaneous traverse of the Sunday television free to air political talkies indicating the agenda of Establishment interests: Better to know ones rivals and allies  in Big Politics and Big Media.

Indeed it’s the tv version monitoring task similar to what Nelson Mandela refers to here in his book Long Walk to Freedom (1994, Abacus) written in Robben Island prison (where he was meant to die like other African resister chiefs of history in the 19C), at page 208

“..newspapers are only a shadow of reality; their information is important to a freedom fighter not because it reveals the truth, but because it discloses the biases and perceptions of both those who produce the paper and those who read it.”

Just substitute ‘Sunday tv political talkie shows’ for "newspapers" in the quote above.

For actual transcripts go to web sites quoted below except with Riley Diary on 7. And note transcripts don’t really give you the image content value.

Media backgrounder

- WS FM runs Tommy Rodonikis attacking adverts using tax dollars for playing politics, should be playing football, ALP's Tim Gartrell authorisation at 10.30 am.

- Ramsey Saturday Herald slam dunk of sad sorry Heiner affair as a political strategy versus Rudd, as Sunday Tele runs Akerman tub thump on same thing on shadow even numbered opinion page. Ramsey has the provenance re Sankey Liberal legal trickery too. BUT the Heiner shredding is really a symptom ofthis: the Fitzgerald Inquiry wanted to put the salts through the ALP after doing the Nats over in the 1980ies, but Fitz was prevented from doing so by incoming ALP Goss govt to avoid “a lawyers picnic”. This is the story that hasn’t been written – that Joh’s deep corruption had tainted the ALP too, even if the Heiner matter is a blind alley, echoes of Beattie wheeling Joh’s wheelchair?

- Megalogenis at The Australian, and Hartcher et al Fairfax slam dunk the boondoggle agrarian socialists  in the National Party guilty of disastrous land clearing,and lying (Vaile: $100B economic contribution, only $25B, disjunction of export to food security etc) as to their economic importance. They only exist to prop Howard prime ministership but they are easily on the wrong side of ecological history.

- Laughable hypocrisy of sneering News Ltd on the one hand distributing Climate Clever booklet, and advert page 21 in Sunday Telegraph but calling it “Greenhouse mania” in their editorial in The Australian weekend copy AND $2 Will Bailey …err Tim Blair in Sat Tele calling everyone else hyprocrites for caring about climate with dirt in both papers recently on Dr Karl (Strewth column in the Oz Sept 28, p3 of Saturday Telegraph) for getting involved in the Climate Change Coalition electioneering. Notice the shift in emphasis – yeah DCC is real but its techno fixes and our Coalition side that’s got it covered. Only they haven’t, and it won’t be techno, but cultural, well both really.

- Onya Ziggy, confirms Howard very pro nuclear energy in The Oz.

- Here comes (reports Chris Merritt) the bogus tort of privacy  to enbale big corporates to reassert legal ascendancy after asbestos/Hardies inspired reform of defamation law to really debate the corrupt multinationals and smaller wannabes.

- Tas pulp mill not an economic goer in fact - just all boondoggle corruption really - per Oz p6 28/9/07, repeat of p2 8/9/07. And John Lyons suggests its increasingly as unpopular as equine flu

- Big profile one page profile for media tart Mick Kelty and his 'AFP family' re police remembrance day but as much special pleading on Haneef, elsewhere stories of Chaser possibly to get off with wrist slap major embarrassment, and Mamdouh Habib scandal of forged evidence in The Oz.

- Meanwhile the Climate Change Coalition and Greens (pictured above) are vying for full page adverts in SMH monthly glossy Sydney Mag, and Good Weekend respectively on populist DCC. Greens have the machine for my money.

- 2 page advertorial by GHD promoting Al Gore visit and business sustainability in The Oz, Thursday or so (advert offline)

- Perhaps the most uplifting aspect of the weekend press is Kessing getting a $40K handshake from the big media for doing his public duty only to cop a conviction and 3 year legal merry go round and lose his job.

- Another uplift - NSW govt contradicts its own nature by saving a few red gums for now, say till the federal election?

 

 

- Idealistic media run images of caged reality 'installation' on Bondi Beach in Fairfax, Australian and ABC tv news etc, so naturally Saturday Telegraph runs a 2 pages 25, 26 spoiler about : 'Beirut' Bondi with repeat pics of same Mekano digger, repeat pics of same high rise renovation, and repeat of same story we ran here on SAM ie allusion to 'battle ground Bondi' ...oh was it April or May 07? Having voted as councillor 10 years ago for the west side of Campbell Pde upgrade the real story is why the Federal Govt continue to spend next to nothing on Bondi Beach maintenance when tens of millions visit per year. That's a real story.

- WWF report damns Howard Govt strategy: Fri 28th Sept Sept p3 SMH by Marian Wilkinson, seriously smart new 'environment editor', next to

- We noticed page 5 of The Oz 3 picture splitting story (show above)about Not Happy John team getting a chill from charmer Maxine McKew in The Oz, who doesn't want the abrasive aspect to her outreach. This writer felt a twinge of criticism, but agree with the notion Howard Hating is no way forward for previous supporters of Howard because it provides no room for dishonourable disengagement from the Rodent. And the real point is as Silas once of NHJ and now of Get Up will tell you, Maxine has her own new 'NHJ' run by Brett Solomon/Evan Thorley et al. So dear John Valder it is time to focus on Wentworth where they enjoy a bit more biffo compared to Epping. Mind you Darling Point and Double Bay are very Epping too even if the white picket is more deck and balustrade than fence paling.

- Interesting splitting angle by Howard's office promoting ex ALP PM Hawke as the current PM's confidant, probably on yellowcake, as Hawke does ALP tub thump tour in WA to great effect. A prime ministerial warning to silver bodgie to back off or the rep get's it? All leveraging Hawke/Keating hostility with sledge of latter woven into the story, where else but p1 Australian 28/9/07

- Bloggers are newspapers 'best friend' for effectively promoting their online adverts by links

- Errol Simper blows the whistle on axing of the Natural History Unit at the ABC who 'coincidentally' broadcast the anti logging The Last Valley. You join the dots. Similarly Amanda Meade notes Kim Dalton not welcome at Eureke awards.

- 'Rangoon detains activist over rally' - August 27 2007, The Australian p12. That is the tragedy there was brewing at least 5 weeks ago.

- Hans Blix plea for nuclear disarmament was lost in all the APEC palaver, 28/8/07 p13 SMH

- nice to hear Cats win the AFL grand final, because we didn't bother watching after the 3rd quarter in disgust at the mismatch, and the surly 'play the man not the ball' mediocrity of the Port Adelaide defence. You have to be hungry for the ball and that's the real joy of the game, not the other side. Port were psychologically misdirected.

- oldie but a goodie, battery charged bicycles for the hills in Sydney. 28/8/07 SMH p14.

Meet the Press

Drought climate nexus Vaile is talent. Press roundup re Cats win afl grandfinal. Union slush fund story, Telstra to target Howard Coalition, poll Nov 24 last Saturday in November?

Voter drought? Vaile smirks re date no confirmation. Vaile doesn’t discount dangerous climate change (DCC) causes drought at least in tone while quoting history of previous “cyclical droughts”. True but sounds like he is scared too. As he might be.

Vaile admits agri welfare like auto and TCF sector. “Survival mechanism” ironic ie of National Party [that will only have pro mining economic support after farm shrinks]

My space question ‘kid’ from Toowoomba Qld student. Ans re full employment stay in regional Australia.  Outtake scratchy my space questions.

1^st advert Get Up spoof of govt climate change PR strong on sleaze aspect of hypocritical govt record re Kyoto spoiling etc. As per 1st quarter of AFL yesterday.

Annabel Crabb Fairfax, Glenn Milne in News Ltd. Rudd footage on positive agendas.

How many Nationals in Cabinet if they win? Depends on the vote. To and fro

Question on $1B road election promise leak in Daily Telegraph. AC tries to flush out extra to budget $22B to 2014, old money or not? Vaile fudges. Still negotiating.

Nuclear – over the next 10 years turn to this? AC bouncer again. AC steel in velvet glove with her pinny dress. Again Vaile fudges.

‘Same sex marriage’, my space question – traditional line, keep word as it meant. Moved along way on property, super etc discrimination rights.

Animation from The Australian – laugh out loud, dream runner stops for another bloody inquiry on anything [but post Fitzgerald ALP which gives some logic misdirected Heiner business]

2^nd adbreak – IR advert bonuses for corporate board, strong impact.

Kortlang moonlighting from abc spin doctos with Trioli, Liberal Party provenance but acute open amusing all the same. Lib leadership polling dynamics. Pretty “amazing” Turnbull is no.4 after Howard Costello Downer. It’s time? No – Affair with Kevin Rudd,everyweekend goes home to Howard. Over next 5 weeks Rudd is going to say have to live with me.

Long campaign like Hawke in 1984? Peacock got closer when had nothing. Howard longer campaign to close Rudd down. Only differences really Kyoto, Work Choices, troops out of Iraq, rest is campaign he implies re stumbles and bumbles.

www. Myspace.com/meetthepeople

Transcript in due course www.ten.com.au/meetthepress

Myspace web address:

7 Weekend Sunrise, 8.35-40 am Riley Diary  -

http://www.seven.com.au/sunrise/weekend

Insiders 2

Indy edition with Bob Katter and Tony Windsor. Latter torpedo re PM ad hocery in face of Rudd, and supports renewable energy too. IR sleeper issue.

Paul Kelly soliliquy - missed a fair bit, and every person segment.

Home page is http://www.abc.net.au/insiders/

Sunday 9

Goes the TWU follow up with Tony Sheldon. Using discreet fund to run election related campaign on IR which is what unions do, just like business. Get out your egg beater eh 9? As Ray said off transcript last week - won't the coalition love that story. Well der it was their story.

Adbreak with pro IR WorkPlace Authority of Govt - straight electioneering ad we paid for. Corrupt.

TWU gets badgered by Ross Coulthard. Ray says "I'm sure Mr Howard and Mr Costello will love those non answers."

Next story is electioneering - young voters enrollment issue. Angus from Sydney Uni SRC with Albanese all over the issue. Token balancer story from conservative ch9?

Feature is Iraq war troops thesis both sides very similar. Weird referral of foreign policy to troops on the ground. Since when?

.......................

http://sunday.ninemsn.com.au/sunday/default.asp

Posted by editor at 10:31 AM NZT

Updated: Wednesday, 3 October 2007 9:57 PM NZT

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Mood:  sharp

We received this forlorn email today from an environmental friend which is a message from the global version of Get Up called Avaaz.org:

Burma is ruled by one of the most brutal military dictatorships in the world. For decades the Burmese regime has fought off pressure--imprisoning elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi and democracy activists, wiping out thousands of villages, imposing forced labour, creating refugees-

But last Tuesday Buddhist monks and nuns, revered in Burma, began marching and chanting prayers. The protests spread as hundreds of thousands of ordinary people and public figures joined in, finding the hope they’d lost. Now they’re facing crackdown – so please, show your solidarity to this movement towards reconciliation and democracy and sign the emergency petition supporting the Burmese people -- it'll be delivered to United Nations Security Council members and international media all week:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/stand_with_burma/tf.php?CLICK_TF_TRACK

In the past, Burma's military rulers have massacred the demonstrators and crushed democracy. The world must stand with the Burmese people at this time, to show the military rulers that the world will not tolerate repression and violence.

Right now, global leaders are gathering in New York for the annual United Nations summit. In speeches, press interviews but also in real actions, we need them to show Burma's military junta that the global community is willing to act in solidarity with the protesters.

Show your solidarity to this movement for peace and democracy and sign the emergency petition supporting the Burmese people. It'll be delivered to UN Security Council members and the UN press corps all week:

http://www.avaaz.org/en/stand_with_burma/tf.php?CLICK_TF_TRACK

Thank you for your help!

Our reply is a bit more lateral:

We need to target Singapore which provides cover for the illegal drug trade there in Burma by providing money laundering, while hanging their own odd drug trafficker and user, to sanitise organised crime at senior govt levels of Singapore. We should also target India as a big customer of Burma's Junta. China another big customer for raw materials is probably retreating from active influence in the lead up to Beijing Olympics to sanatise its own tragic record on human rights. Normally China props up several dictators e.g. North Korea and Burma as a buffer from western norms of transparency, just as it abuses its own internal diversity:

 

Thursday, 27 September 2007

Should the world boycott the Beijing Olympics for Chinese human rights abuse?
Mood:  sad
Topic: human rights

 

My impression the fate of the Burmese and North Koreans, is the fate of 70M Falung gong inside China's border. That is extreme fatal violence.

Alot of the world's media are targetting the evil crazy Junta in Burma specifically, but the geopolitiks looks alot more sordid and corrupt than just the internal dictators of Burma. They are a prop as best I can tell. Just like Saddam was for the USA versus Iran, and the pathetic Saudi Wahabist royals vis a vis the rest of the Arabs.

 

One reason I would guess Burma's people are stirring right now is because China is retreating from the Junta with the approach of the Olympics given pressure on human rights in China itself to be sanitised. So Burmese dictators have to make do on their own to manage geo political pressure for change. Without as much Chinese support we see more economic unravel like rising petrol prices. We see less effectively organised state power against democratic opposition. What hope the little folks in this evil power mongering in the shadow of the next Olympics?

 

One hopes greater democracy for the Burmese might be a consolation prize to the world for giving Beijing the Olympics?

Posted by editor at 3:36 PM NZT

Updated: Thursday, 27 September 2007 4:26 PM NZT

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Mood:  sad

On August 3, Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, the Ranking Member on the U.S. House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on International Organizations, Human Rights and Oversight, introduced a House Resolution to boycott the 2008 Summer Olympic Games in Beijing.

He explained, "The Olympics represent the noblest elements of humanity and the Chinese regime represents the opposite. The Olympic torch is supposed to be a beacon of light shining upon mankind's higher aspirations in the world and it's a travesty to have that torch hosted by a regime that is the world's worst human rights abuser."

	Because she practiced Falun Gong, Ms. Wei Fengju was tortured to near death in the Heizuizi Forced labor Camp. Unable to recover, she passed away on July 11, 2007.

On March 28, 2007, actress Mia Farrow, a good-will ambassador for the United Nations Children's Fund, drew the world's attention to the Beijing Olympics when she and her son Ronan wrote an op-ed article for the Wall Street Journal [1]. In the article, Farrow launched a campaign to label the 2008 Olympics the "Genocide Olympics." Her forthright candor gave voice to the world's awakening shock at Communist China's ever-burgeoning atrocities, its total disregard for human values and its severe human rights violations.

Not only is China bankrolling Darfur's Genocide [2]; for more than eight years it has sought to eliminate Falun Gong, which in 1999 had an estimated 70 million practitioners in China; it has likewise abused democracy activists, lawyers, human rights defenders, religious leaders, journalists, trade unionists, Tibetan Buddhists, Uighurs, ''unofficial'' church members, and political dissidents.

In 2004, Asma Jahangir the United Nations Special Rapporteur for Extrajudicial, Summary or Arbitrary Executions stated, "The Special Rapporteur continues to be alarmed by deaths in custody in China. Reports describe harrowing scenes in which detainees, many of whom are followers of the Falun Gong movement, die as a result of severe ill treatment, neglect or medical inattention. The cruelty and brutality of these alleged acts of torture defy description."

... full story continues here

Posted by editor at 2:59 PM NZT

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Mood:  irritated

Great Australian land clearing Hoax

Compiled by David Paull [Sept 2007]

02 68424940

·        Land clearing laws have not stopped Australian land clearing as all efforts at compliance have been ineffective.

·        Official satellite monitoring figures are suspect, as monitoring systems underestimate all vegetation clearing.

·        Official clearing approvals continue at rates similar to that before the introduction of new Native Vegetation legislation

·        Any real decrease in deforestation are more likely due to the fact that natural vegetation systems are fast disappearing and are becoming more endangered

·        This is all in the context of global warming.

Every year since 2002, the Federal Environment Minister has put out a press release to accompany the publication of the National Greenhouse Gas Inventory stating that Australia is “on track” to meet the target set under the Kyoto Protocol of an average of 108 per cent of 1990 emission levels over the period 2008-12.

Because of good agricultural conditions, the late 1980s and early 1990s happened to be bumper years for land clearing, particularly in Queensland. This raised Australia’s emissions in the Kyoto base year of 1990 by about 30 per cent, making the 108 per cent target far cheaper and easier to achieve. Due to the Australia clause, any reduction in land clearing could offset emission increases from burning fossil fuels.

This is precisely what has occurred. Between 1990 and 2004, emissions from most sectors have sky-rocketed. For example, stationary energy and transport emissions increased by 43 per cent and 23 per cent respectively. However, these increases have been offset by a 73 per cent decline in emissions from land use change, providing an apparently respectable 2.3 per cent increase in overall emissions.

But has land clearing really stopped?

Posted by editor at 1:59 PM NZT

Updated: Tuesday, 1 January 2008 6:33 PM EADT

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Mood:  special

We have been doing our best to catch up the press after the frenzy of political wonkiness during the APEC week earlier this month of Sept 07. Our fat file is in the high draw of the filing cabinet on top of another cabinet.

But we had to seek out and link these two unusual contributions, one by Phil Burgess a US expatriate high level Telstra executive with some embarrassing things to say about security protocols, at least apparently because we don't necessarily agree with second guessing the effectiveness of their covert ways. Did they already know it was Phil Burgess, a very distinctive chap in the first place. Here is his piece in The Australian main opinion page and its quite a lark:

Chaser cut to the charade Phil Burgess | September 10, 2007

The other whimsical article well worth clipping was poor Mr Paul O'Sullivan. Not just any citizen but chief of ASIO, possibly offline at page 9 Monday Sept 10 2007 by Sian Powell:

Osama gets in, but not the ASIO chief

"ASIO chief Paul O'Sullivan was refused entry into two venues during APEC leaders' week in Sydney, but an Osama bin Laden lookalike in a fake Canadian motorcade was waved through two police checkpoints.

APEC security was a bizarre combination of the laughably incompetent and the overzealous, critics say.

The Australian Security Intelligence Organisation said Mr O'Sullivan was not inconvenienced by the suspicious officers who blocked his entry into the venues. "It was a minor administrative detail, quickly worked out," a spokesman said yesterday."

We don't second guess effectiveness of what covert operational activities the security agencies are involved in, because we don't by definition know. But we note this book published with the help of our grandfather Eric McLoughlin as a senior journalist with the Sydney Morning Herald back in the mid 1950ies which according to the key spy who brought Petrov over from Stalin's Soviet was none too impressed with the ASIO forerunner called ASO back then.

Reading between the lines fluent Russian speaker Michael Bialoguski thought ASO were thick, culturally unsophisticated, arrogant pseudo Brits, and he was on the same side given demise of his Polish family under the communist heal in the 1940ies. On the ASO side they thought he was a double agent. Tricky stuff.

Posted by editor at 8:58 PM NZT

Updated: Wednesday, 26 September 2007 10:11 PM NZT

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Mood:  quizzical

The trouble with drought relief is that it props up unviable farms. The Australian recognises the terrible pressure a drought puts on individuals, families and communities, but drought assistance is a government intervention and as with any government intervention, it distorts the market. So long as farmers in marginal agricultural enterprises know that the Government will bail them out, they defer the difficult decision to cut their losses and leave the land. Whereas other unviable industries go to the wall in the face of changing conditions, there is an assumption that farmers should not be allowed to go broke, and if they do, they should be given assistance to exit the industry. When droughts break, as the always do, new entrants go in, enjoying the good times and then expecting a handout when the next drought hits.

Sadly, the lead up to a federal election is no time to expect rational economic decisions, but this is what is required. Handouts to unviable farms are a drain on the public purse and on scarce resources such as water, and by putting subsidised products in the market, they make it harder for viable farms to survive. [bold added]

Posted by editor at 8:15 PM NZT

Updated: Tuesday, 1 January 2008 5:22 PM EADT

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Mood:  incredulous

Picture: p1 Australian Financial Review 24th Sept 07. There go the civil liberties online?

It was surreal as dawn events often can be. Seven am Phillip St Sydney. 10th floor of the Supreme Court Building. Missing my sleep.  Lawyers badge on in case of wire cage barriers. Blinking at the sombre procession of barristers, protesters, media, the Beak, senior coppers. Far below on the steps we saw banners, face paint, police on bicycles, and plain clothes Australian Federal Police, one of whom gave me a card by way of sussing this community media practitioner out.

We gave the card to David Marr of the SMH later on that day as he nipped around gleaning here, gleaning there for his sketch pieces.

 It was early September and still cold.

So this was democracy.

And then there was Mr X. Quite chatty and enthusiastic He was an interested onlooker in the gallery sticky beaking at proceedings on the way to somewhere else in the Court building perhaps. Many people wanted to know if the Stop Bush Rally was going to be allowed during this super security conscious APEC week.

"What's your role in all this?" X asked. "Community media" I slouched. We got to chatting. He trusted me a bit. Gave me his card too. Then he shared this little gem as we moved away from Big Ears who gave me the other card:

Seems about 2 years ago AFP chief Mick Kelty had allegedly been at a conference of legal big wigs and gave a speech. He talked about the age of errorism and he let it out that he had been having informal chats with judges along the lines

- you don't understand, these people are capable of things you wouldn't believe

- you don't know what these people are really like

- you are going to have to adjust your thinking and make decisions appropriate to the times of much greater security.

At least that was the gist of it as I understood the allegation. Which is very interesting. Because if it is true it suggests an old boy/girl network of extra judicial lobbying outside the well worn processes of evidence in the legal system, complete with upcoming anti terrorism cases. To save the village by autocractically changing the village, openly or otherwise. The power behind the facade of the ballot box? The old Ken Livingstone book comes to mind: "If voting changed anything they'd abolish it"

It also resonates with some speeches the sainted Mick Kelty is reported today about yet more changes to our legal system needed to ensure (perfect?) security in what has always been an uncertain world:

Prevention is better than crime

Mick is a clever CEO all the same. While pushing the conservative buttons on the Coalition side, on the other hand he is spruiking the risks of climate change to security in the 21C which would be music to the ears of the ALP, as reported here on ABC AM this morning:

Police Commissioner enters climate change debate/ The Federal Police Commissioner Mick Keelty has labelled climate change the biggest security issue of the century and he's detailed the problems he sees caused by global warming.

Yep Kelty is a contemporary man, but is he too contemporary to stick to good legal process and norms of democracy? Is he indeed a very political figure in a police uniform playing both sides of the street, and was it ever thus anyway?

Posted by editor at 3:13 PM NZT

Updated: Tuesday, 25 September 2007 4:10 PM NZT

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Mood:  surprised

....Mr Abbott said the election campaign would be about Mr Rudd's political character, not his personal character, and that he was not interested in news that the Labor leader had had a heart valve replaced 14 years ago.

"It's his credibility, not his heart, that's the issue," he said.

"It's his political character that's in question, not his health."

The clash came after Sydney's The Sunday Telegraph newspaper reported that a Howard government minister was a homosexual who visited gay bath houses and was married to a woman as a front to hide his true sexuality.

Veteran Nine Network television reporter Laurie Oakes told The Sunday Program that he had heard the same claim, but from a Liberal Party source.

The source who last week told The Australian about Mr Rudd's heart operation 14 years ago has denied doing so as part of a political conspiracy to hobble Labor's election hopes.

The Queensland health professional - who passed information about Mr Rudd's medical history to one of this newspaper's journalists on Monday - yesterday admitted being a Liberal Party member, but denied acting at the behest of anyone else.

In particular, the source denied discussing the matter with any party official or MP - despite Opposition claims that the surfacing of the rumours in a Nine Network news bulletin was the work of a Liberal Party dirty tricks machine.

"There's no Liberal Party plot here as far as I'm aware," the source said yesterday. "It's an absolute nonsense."

.............

Postscript #1

We have just noticed this subdued headline the day before in The Australian at page 21 of the Saturday issue by Franklin's superior on the food chain there, Dennis Shanahan, which reveals similarly the real Liberal Party member fingerprint, but 'no conspiracy': "At the heart of a conspiracy theory" possibly offline.

Posted by editor at 2:46 PM NZT

Updated: Wednesday, 26 September 2007 8:57 PM NZT

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