Submitted by rickeyre on
A man burst into a busy central London restaurant and chopped off his own penis with a knife in front of horrified diners, police and reports said on Tuesday.
The Guardian takes up the story. London-eating.co.uk has some reviews of the restaurant in question in case you fancy a nibble.
Submitted by rickeyre on
This Cricket World Cup has been too short. Blink, and you find it's almost over...
It seems like only yesterday when the World Cup was officially opened by the British West Indies' finest cricketer to date, Lebrun Constantine, in a ceremony transmitted live via morse code to a worldwide audience of hundreds.
Submitted by rickeyre on
"...if it doesn't rain in sufficient volume over the next six to eight weeks, there will be no water allocations for irrigation purposes in the [Murray-Darling] Basin."
- John Winston Howard, press conference, 19.4.07
It would be easy to see this as another example of the PM playing politics and thus response with the line Howard to Farmers: Drop Dead. But it's a problem much more genuine and more serious than that.
Submitted by rickeyre on
Vale Kurt Vonnegut 1922-2007.
Submitted by rickeyre on
"The Government will continue to support the UN goal of 0.7 per cent ODA/GNI as an aspiration and endeavour to maintain aid at the highest level, consistent with the needs of partner countries, our own capacity to assist and other priorities for Australian Government expenditure. In September 2005, the Prime Minister announced Australia’s intention to increase its overseas aid allocation to about A$4 billion a year by 2010. Such an increase will represent a doubling of Australia’s overseas aid from 2004 levels."
Submitted by rickeyre on
"It is inconceivable that a country as wealthy as Australia cannot solve a health crisis affecting less than 3% of its population."
- from "Close The Gap: Solutions to the Indigenous Health Crisis facing Australia", April 2007
The NACCHO/Oxfam Australia joint report on the state of indigenous health in this country makes for heartbreaking reading. Just one small extract from the executive summary makes for a depressing introduction:
Submitted by rickeyre on
It must be the first time in these more tsunami-conscious times that the Bureau of Meteorology has issued a tsunami alert for the NSW coast.
An 8.1 earthquake off the Solomons at around 6.40 this morning is known to have caused 15cm waves in the outlying Solomon Islands.
It seems low risk at this time, but links for more information are here:
Submitted by rickeyre on
Part of John Winston Howard's vision of expanding the historical knowledge of Australian schoolchildren has reached fruition. This from the office of the minister for, among other things, Heritage (Malcolm Turnbull):
AUSTRALIAN STUDENTS KEEP OUR HISTORY ALIVE
Minister for the Environment and Water Resources, Malcolm Turnbull MP today announced the winners for the Howard Government’s 2006 inaugural Captain Cook Essay Competition and encouraged students to enter the 2007 competition.
Submitted by rickeyre on
Let's save the rest of the world's forests. But not our own. Oh no, we must not let Australia lose its competitive advantage blah blah blah...
Submitted by rickeyre on
In the tradition of Ronald Reagan (the Greatest American Of All Time) and Pim Fortuyn (the Greatest Dutchperson Of All Time) comes the news that none other than Antonio de Oliveira Salazar has won a poll to choose the greatest Portuguese person ever.
The dictator of Portugal from 1933 to 1968 scored 40 per cent of the vote in the poll of the ten finalists. The runner up was a communist adversary of Salazar's, Alvaro Cunhal.
