The Waiting Man

Sigh... Another day, another death-by-selfie...

Another idiot climbs over a safety barrier to get the 'perfect' selfie shot & everyone is surprised & horrified when she falls to her death??

It ... happens ... all ... the ... time!!!

I'm sorry (NOT SORRY!!), but if you ignore safety advice & climb over fences & barriers at cliff edges, then Darwin's theory of Survival of the Fittest is going to come into effect. If you're THAT stupid, then the human species can get along without you very well. Of course it can

And of course, the fallout & blame will go everywhere but on the egotistical idiot... Higher barriers!! More signs!! Close the lookout!!!

How about... Personal responsibility!! Common sense!!! Remember - there's a nemesis for every act of hubris

I always knew John Squire was the brains behind the Stone Roses

Ian Brown - substandard 'singer', 90s casualty & as a result of those 2 things... completely, utterly & now dangerously off his rocker

“NO LOCKDOWN NO TESTS! NO TRACKS! NO MASKS NO VAX!” (which is what he recently said on Twitter). Further tweets pointed a finger at Bill Gates, who according to tinfoil-hatters brewed up Covid in his secret underground laboratory – a Laboratoire Genocidier, if you will – and unleashed it on the world in an evil plot to reduce the number of people who can buy his softwa… doh!

It could be argued that the New Musical Express has well & truly had its heyday. Pick your decade - 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s... & these days it's not really essential reading, nor that informative

I started reading it in the early 80s, when you could get issues from January, in April, at a couple of good newsagents, or if you wanted to pay a whole lot more, you could get ones that were about a fortnight old from various import record stores. I suppose it was a kind of godsend when they went online & I could finally be up-to-date, but it seemed that most of the good writers I'd enjoyed were gone by then. Where are you, Steven 'Swells' Wells??!

But every now & then, they remember that rebellious spirit they're known for... & today was one of those times, reporting on the trend in the USA for large gatherings of people, with no social distancing & scant regard for masks. Sure, you could get a factual report from Rolling Stone about what happened, but only the NME could report the same thing, only with much more venom...

Why Do People Keep Risking Their Lives To See Shit Bands?

Some highlights...

The ‘Herd Immunity’ festival that took place in Wisconsin in July was quickly renamed ‘July Mini Fest’ after some bands refused to play (not daft haired metallers Static X, though – they were there like a shot in the arm of Covid. Well, do they do – no shit – have a song called ‘Wisconsin Death Trip’). And just last week the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally in South Dakota went ahead, attracting 250,000 people over 10 days and featuring performances from a number of bands including Smash Mouth, whose lead singer Steve Harwell shouted “We’re all here together tonight! Fuck that COVID shit!” to his adoring, non-socially distanced fans.

Imagine, for a moment, being questioned in the hospital about what contact you’ve had with people – were you on a slightly busy bus on your way to your second job that couldn’t be avoided? Perhaps you’re a teacher and caught it from one of your students? No, you were shouting the words to Smash Mouth’s one hit that was in Shrek, while sweating against someone you’ve never met before.

If you haven’t heard The Chainsmokers, picture lift music that’s become sentient. That’s what these people were risking their lives for. A band who are named after a practice that causes cancer, and who look like The Village People trying to look a bit edgy for a night out in Preston Spoons

So I still have a soft spot for the NME - they even mentioned one of my 90s bands once, without tearing us to shreds. Not many bands from those days can say the same...

In case you wanted to know what a proper idiot looks like

It would appear that believing Covid-19 is a hoax &/or a "war on humanity" (which is it??!! It can't be both...) is as contagious as the bloody virus itself - & Australians are getting infected

I said I wouldn't... I know it won't make a bit of difference... I can't let this one go by without drawing attention to it - even if it's just my own

"stop testing so much, you're finding too many cases!!"

The Great Pumpkin has told medical authorities to scale back their Covid19 testing rates, as they're finding too many cases... I mean, where do you even start with such a stupid thing to say, let alone the, for want of a better word, 'thought' process behind it. Sure, he wants the reported cases to go down, so he can spin that into a claim he's winning the war against the virus, so his ignorant redneck supporters can wave their flags & shoot their guns & so his fatcat Republican buddies can continue their business of raping the land & the economy for another 4 years...

Why?? Honestly... Why can't his opponents cut through & call out this puerile bullshit? Why can't even the most ignorant, dyed in the woolly brain, redneck fuck-knuckle see that they're being taken for fools, for a ride, to the cleaners??

Rhetorical... as always

Well, it's been about a week since I touched on this subject - give or take a day...

Are you a 'smug liberal', or a 'reckless republican'?

Some highlights... or lowlights, more accurately...

I’ve heard of Muslim women in America being taunted for wearing hijabs, I’ve heard of Jewish men being mocked for wearing yarmulkes and now I’ve heard it all: A friend of mine was cursed by a passing stranger the other day for wearing a protective mask.

When the president visited Phoenix a week ago, some residents who’d turned out to see him harangued journalists in masks, “saying how we’re only wearing masks to instill fear,” BrieAnna Frank, a reporter with The Arizona Republic, told Tom Jones of Poynter. Frank posted a Twitter thread with videos in which journalists were loudly accused of being “on the wrong side of patriotism” and “like communists.”

Outside the State Capitol in Sacramento two days later, a woman held a sign that said: “Do you know who Dr. Judy Mikovits is? Then don’t tell me I need a silly mask.”

Mikovits is a discredited scientist whose wild assertions and scaremongering regarding vaccines have made her a hero to conspiracy theorists and a social media and YouTube star. Naturally, masks factor into her repertoire. She has claimed that “wearing the mask literally activates your own virus.”

How has this virus become so incredibly politicised in the USA, to the point where people would rather die, than practise common consensus?!?!

Celebrity Chef fined $25,000 for misleading claims about machine that 'cures' Covid19

The culinary mouthpiece in question (I won't call him a chef, as he doesn't seem to do much cooking in high-end restaurants, just sits judging amateur contestants on television, while munching on 'activated' almonds) - has form in this area... he regularly promotes products or produce as having amazing restorative or curative powers, claims to know better than scientists & doctors, or spruiks questionable diets that are the answer to everything from an upset tummy to world peace & global warming... Okay that last bit's an exaggeration, but give him time, I'm sure he'll find something that he will assure us can do it... & give you Marvel superhero-like powers... Probably

Even though it won't stop him mouthing off the next time he finds something with dubious science behind its claims to align the planets & reveal the aliens in our midst, I'm pleased he's been fined by an Authority & that it has been well publicised. If only there were a global organisation which could impose a fine & a muzzle on that other, internationally recognised snake oil salesman...

It's one of the things I wonder & lament about in this modern world... when did we stop listening to scientists, teachers, doctors... & start listening to quacks with fake tans & a media agent?

Certainly, there's an argument to be made about corporate funding to education & science meaning there's no such thing as unquestionable, unbiased research & results, but given that all of the findings must be peer-reviewed before becoming accepted practice, there is a safety net that stops bad science becoming fact. It's (mostly) a free world, so you are welcome to ignore, or reject that science & accept the consequences of doing so... but you shouldn't be free to share your unfounded opinions, beliefs &, above all, products with the rest of the world - preying on the illiterate, the weak, the elderly, the poor... your huddled masses

So, to make the obvious connection to current events - while it may be true that the W.H.O. has been politically compromised, there's no evidence at all that its actual work in this time of plague... or at any other time of crisis, is not to be trusted

Peter Evans, or a Paediatrician... Donald Trump, or a Doctor - the choice is yours... as are the consequences

This irritates me... a story on not-a-REAL-news-website-more-a-collection-of-opinions-&-gossip news.com.au about the panic-buying that started in late February, as everyone prepped for the zombie apocalypse

According to them, The Hoarders Were Right! because supermarkets are continuing to have stock shortages on many items... Yes... BECAUSE THE FUCKING HOARDERS BOUGHT IT ALL WHEN THEY DIDN'T NEED TO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

But this makes me feel a bit better about it

Not god... these idiots...

Why don't they just get the damned virus & see how far their science-denial gets them then...

Then again... Why don't these people get the virus?!?!?

The Statesman-like Donald Trump is dead... long live the Idiot

So now it's all the media's fault... well, the ones he doesn't like, anyway

It's amazing that it's headline news when he doesn't act like an idiot...

Seriously, you know-nothing, orange buffoon... Stop it!!

During expansive remarks on Fox News host Sean Hannity's program, the president continued to break with public health officials' more dire messaging regarding the international crisis and forcefully contradicted the WHO, which earlier in the week pegged the global mortality rate for the coronavirus at 3.4 percent.

"Well I think the 3.4 percent is really a false number. Now, and this is just my hunch, and — but based on a lot of conversations with a lot of people that do this. Because a lot of people will have this and it's very mild. They'll get better very rapidly. They don't even see a doctor. They don't even call a doctor," Trump said.

"You never hear about those people. So you can't put them down in the category of the overall population in terms of this corona flu and — or virus. So you just can't do that," he continued. "So if, you know, we have thousands or hundreds of thousands of people that get better, just by, you know, sitting around and even going to work — some of them go to work but they get better."

This from the man who thought a 'flu vaccine would cure Covid19... Sounds like an expert to me!!

I'm surprised it took this long for the conspiracy theorists to join the dots in a whole new, loopy way...

So Covid19 isn't a serious virus, it's the perfect way to cover up symptoms from 5G network radiation... or something...

"A YouTube video with the title "WUHAN CORONA VIRUS IS A 5G L.E.D SMART STREET LIGHT TEST BED" is also popular in this group and others. Other YouTube videos share complex conspiracy theories including a suggestion that the Diamond Princess cruise ship whose passengers had to be quarantined was affected by the virus because it used 5G technology for its connectivity."

The world is a dangerous place... especially with people like that out there... & I mean really out there!

... Another Trump moment of "very stable genius"

Don't worry about the new corona virus Summer will kill it!! Yes... ignore all those pesky doctors, immunologists & the World Health Organisation - what the hell do they know?? The good ol' USA Summer heat will deal with this latest Chinese threat, because Donald says so...

But Don... the USA Winter was supposed to kill off global warming... I can tell you from down here... it didn't!!

What this absolute bullshit does do, is put into perspective the nutjobs I briefly argued with online a few weeks back, who were telling me that it's impossible to have 'dry' lightning, without torrential rainstorms. They know, because Florida is the lightning Capital of the world"... the WHOLE WORLD!!! I'm not sure they even know the southern hemisphere of this planet exists, let alone the major differences in weather patterns we experience. Hell, why don't they ask the people living in the desert states of their own country about dry lightning?!?!

But no... everything's fine because Donald says so... & they live in the USA & I don't - something I am incredibly grateful for, sometimes...

I love a good conspiracy theory... especially a loony, religious one!!

Makes a change from blaming the Greens, or arsonists, or the Illuminati...

Anti-discrimination... Australian style

In a nutshell, our bible-waving Prime Minister wants to pass legislation ostensibly to protect 'religious freedom', that will, as a by-product, basically allow anyone to spout bigotry & hate speech, without fear of prosecution

Provided you're a white Christian, of course... Guaranteed if you're a Muslim or Aboriginal who speaks your mind, they'll lock you up & deport you. Yes, even if you were born here. I'm certain they'll find a way to send our indigenous people back to Asia "where they came from"... sure it was 60,000+ years ago, but there must be a way...