So over the next 3 weeks, in addition to working about 9 hours a day, I will be swotting up on basic Hindi phrases and how to negotiate a good price on Indian silks and saris.

Also all I know about India is that the people like cricket, it’s bureaucratic, and it’s a fellow ex-colony.  All I know about Bangalore is that there are lots of IT companies and call centers in addition to my client’s offices.  I also know about the dysentery, not to give money to beggars and to pack my own cutlery as I have no desire to learn how to eat everything with my right hand.

If anyone out there in blogland has any travel advice about going to India for business, I’d be glad to hear about it.  I know that with business travel you miss out on all the exciting sight seeing during the day and just want to know where you can go in the evenings to relax, have a decent meal and possibly do something slightly cultural that you can’t do at home.

Work-life balance: rhetoric v reality

One thing I learned fairly early on is that given time, the opportunity to ask questions and good guidance, I can figure most things out for myself.  I could also complete exams and assignments fairly successfully.  So in light of that, why on earth would I cheat – especially as if someone put a different answer up to me, I’d be hard pressed to pick the right one if I was unsure.  Others would have just as much if not more chance of getting things wrong than me.  As I’ve become older I’ve learned that I’m mostly right when it comes to content, so why use someone else’s potentially inferior work?

The other reason why I tend not to cheat, especially in other scenarios such as games, sports, etc, is that it diminishes my sense of achievement.  I know I can do well if I play fairly.  If I cheated I would never know just how well I can do.  Possibly the only other time I could think of where cheating would help me get ahead is in the job application process – but this is more lying than cheating.  The fact of the matter is, people can spot bullshit and they don’t like it when they do.  I can actually get ahead on my own merits.  That and I’m a terrible liar, so I’m sure I’d get caught out.

Possibly I’m just not devious enough to go on a show like that – many of the questions seemed to also be geared towards ambitious people who think that being impulsive and aggressive get you ahead.  Really they only get you so far.  If there is one thing I learned from helping to prepare reports for the board of my last company it’s that you need a lot of information to make sensible decisions and good plans when you’re on the top.  That and thinking quickly on your feet should not be confused with impulsive behaviour.

I don't normally do tributes to famous people.  Afterall, they have enough family and friends to mourn for them.  However I feel the need to speak.  For some reason people think that Jeff Goldblum has died in New Zealand and I've even got the news article to cite here:

http://jeff.goldblum.mediafetcher.com/news/top_stories/actor_new_zealand.php

The thing is, he is not dead.  The article was generated from www.fakeawish.com and if you don't beleive me you can not only regenerate the report to see, but try it out for your least favourite celbs. 

Sadly we'll all have to believe that Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett are no longer with us (and to think I'd just driven past MJ's house on one of the celebrity stalker Star tours last month!

The number one reason I have a car is for the convenience.  Public transport in Brisbane is not very convenient.  Now I don’t drive to work, I do take the bus or train for that, but I certainly need to drive in the evenings and on weekend.  Outside of peak hour there is very little transport and it’s also not very safe at all (I’ve been assaulted three times in my life, once was walking to a train station and the other time was at the South Bank busway stop.

When I first started working in town – about 4 years ago – I drove into work about two days a week.  This was because I had university in the evenings and by the time I finished at 8pm or 9pm my next bus was at 8:45pm or 9:45pm and I had no desire to wait in a poorly lit area near King George Square full of kids drinking just being invited to be assaulted.  It was actually quite affordable with early bird parking costing $15-$18 depending on where you went.  Since then King George Square has been dug up for the bus way (it used to be a car park) and at least two other parking buildings that I can think of have been redeveloped.  I don’t doubt that most of the people driving in probably lived in areas where public transport was rather inconvenient and they all now headed for the Myer Centre or the Wintergarden.  Last time I looked early bird parking was $30 and climbing.  Given that many smaller places to $40 a day max, it really wasn’t that much of a discount and for someone like me that lives 5kms out of the city it’s now cheaper to catch a cab.  It is really inconvenient that the council and the state government have allowed all the parking to be taken out of the city with no thought about the consequences, but I have noticed more than a few.  First of all the South Bank carpark that use to be $15 a day is now only that price if you’re there for a few hours as all the people who have to drive into town but now have no where to park have now headed there.  And the other thing I’ve found out is that people are now parking in at the Mater hospital as there is a busway station just down stairs.  It’s also extremely expensive, but it is convenient and I’ve had one relative not been able to get a park there for a medical appointment and another friend who has been quite generously given discount vouchers to park to visit her very sick mother.  However instead of seeing consequences like less parking in town = people using up parking for other places, I am pretty sure that the government has been thinking less parking in town = more people using public transport.

The answer to this is yes and no.  No because some people can not use public transport as it is infrequent, inconvenient, dirty, crowded and generally inaccessible for anyone who lives further out of town than I do.  Yes because there are just more and more people living in Brisbane than ever and not all of them can afford to drive.  It has annoyed me for some time that there are no car parks at my train station after 7:30am, even after being expanded a few weeks back.  And train stations like Park Road that would be really convenient to catch the train from, have only 10 parking spaces and the surrounding streets are in the Gabba 2 hour parking zone (which is not well signed and I only found out about this from getting a ticket).  Also most trains are standing room only by the time they’ve gone a few stops.  I wondered about this the other week, thinking it would be nice if they put more trains on, only to realize that between 7am and 9am there are actually about 5 per hour going through my station (plus some express ones I don’t get to catch).  That’s heaps.  And they already hold up traffic fairly significantly as the level crossing just in front of the station is over a main road.  (Don’t even get me started on level crossings).  Busses are more frequent for me, but hardly less crowded and definitely slower and dirtier.  I never really noticed until one of my friends who moved here from the states noted that it took her over an hour door to door to get to work.  Last week as well I spoke to a fellow at a rival firm who lived not too far from where I am who said he’d taken to jogging home as it only took 15 mins more than catching the bus.  (I’m actually thinking of walking one or two nights a week now!)

But the thing that really bugs me about parking at the moment is the suburb that I live in just seems to not have enough of it.  There are a lot of units in my area.  And most units are 2-3 bedrooms, occupied by 2-3 young workers, and has one garage for their 2-3 cars.  In my area I’ve also noticed we have quite a few tradies and cabbies, who have their private car, work car and usually a flat mate or two with their own vehicles.  Needless to say there is never any parking in the street for all the residents cars (fortunately I’m related to all of the body corporate members for my building so I get to park on the grass).  The street in front of my unit is highly prized parking and we frequently get people parking in the mail zone and also right up to the corner.  Some authority has responded by painting a yellow line all the way around the corner, making the highly prized parking space even more at a premium and the residents in my and the neighboring block now have to compete for parking in the side streets – which are also full of units with residents competing for space on the street.  And whilst the yellow line out the front has temporarily solved the problem of people parking where they shouldn’t, it does little to solve the underlying problem which has been created by not mandating sufficient parking in unit development and also that units have an increasing number of occupants due to extortionate property and rental prices.

So all I have to say to the state government and to the city council is stop trying to punish us for having cars!  You can do two things to help us, first of all ensure that there is more parking – in our residences, our city and out public transport facilities.  And secondly put some decent public transport in if you want less people to own and use cars.

This issue regarding the Qld car dealer and his mates Krudd and Swann is was looking like a very dangerous game for some people in high places in the government.  Regardless of the amounts involved, if an MP discusses specific recipients of government funding with their ministry especially when the specific recipient has a relationship with the MP, then this is dangerous territory.  And this applies regardless of the nature of the relationship – if an MP were to have a poor relationship with an applicant and wanted to disadvantage them, it would be the same as exerting influence to gain favor.  And this is regardless of whether the MP has received anything in the way of gifts or favors from the private citizen (or organization) in question.  If someone who is a minister or in a high position in the government attempts to exert this sort of influence, then it reflects poorly on the whole cabinet and is a clear sign that accountability is lax.  It is completely unacceptable.  Besides being the text book definition of corruption, pork barreling and nepotism, this sort of behavior actually runs fundamentally against how our system of government should work.  At all times parliament, the executive and the courts should operate independently of one another.  The example here is having a member of parliament trying to influence the decision making of the executive runs contrary to the fundamentals of how an accountable, fair and democratic government is to operate.  It is totally despicable.

Krudd and Swan must be thanking their lucky stars that the email has turned out to be an obvious fake, as they have not been performing particularly well in this fiasco.  Rudd’s response has been to challenge Turnbull to table the alleged email between Swann’s office in parliament or resign seemed like a ridiculous claim.  Even now saying the should resign is wrong, as Turnbull, not being an IT expert would have just taken the email on face value.  Also it was the media that had revealed the presence of the email and the Leader of the Opposition had asked the PM and Treasurer to be accountable regarding the email.  Yesterday’s attack was that Turnbull is inconsistent because he said that he heard about it in the media on Friday when it really came out on a Saturday. 

Is it just me or has Rudd lost the plot?  Getting your days mixed up (or even unintentionally letting slip that you may have had a tip off from the media a day earlier than publication) is a forgettable error of fact.  Next to the attempts of a government minister to influence a Department to advantage a supporter, it is a negligible issue.  If you and a close ally are on a knife edge when it comes to being proven to be corrupt, saying your main opponent is inconsistent is probably the most minor point you could make.  Rudd and Swann are at a point where they either need to deny or come clean.  Or if they can find a scape goat.

Today they are off the hook, but I am sure they are conscious of the fact that the allegations, even before the email had been produced, actually seemed to stick.  This is something we would easily believe KRudd and Turnbull capable of.

I am wondering at the timing of this as well.  I’m not sure if Grech, the fellow from the treasury tied up in all this – who was found to have the email on his home computer – is playing to suit some party in the government.  But I’m also wondering if perhaps it’s Rudd’s own team out to get him as much as the Opposition.  I know that the vacancy left by Fitzgibbon allowed for a raft of ministerial changes and I also understand that Rudd’s own faction was heavily favored in the reshuffle.  Again, correct me if I’m wrong, but I understand that Rudd’s faction does not have the numbers by it’s self to elect a member as PM – hence there may have been some toes stepped on in the latest reshuffle.  Given that there are also some very ambitious players in the ALP front bench, and given that they ALP did not have any chance of gaining government without Rudd at the helm.  I get the feeling that perhaps the knives are out for Rudd and Swann now that the ALP is where they want to be.  If there is one lesson that can be learned from Keating taking over from Hawke, is that a hostile take over of leadership does not equate to much damage at all in the polls.  But that is just idle speculation on my behalf.  I do watch with eager anticipation to see if the AFP will find out who produced the email and how they will be brought to task.

I’m kind of disappointed that there are advocates screaming blue murder* about public service cut backs, and no salary increases for teachers and nurses and the like, but no one is thinking of we consultants.

Now I know that most of you probably think that we are a mob of sponging no-hopers, but the fact of the matter is most of us do very good work and our clients love us.  We are in essence corporate (or government) problem solvers and industry specialists and experts.  Not all organizations can afford to hire or train people to have the best or latest knowledge and not all organizations can cope with their workload, hence we help out.  I will also note that my company in particular provides functions like Internal Audit, Risk Management, IT security support etc, so it’s not completely pointless stuff.

One thing I have found out was cut in the Commonwealth budget and now in the state government is consulting fees.  And not only is it bad news, but it’s something of a false economy.  (Whilst it’s yet to impact my organization, I’m worried that it may.)  Many organizations like mine are hired to do project work and also because the government has chosen to outsource some or all of it’s IT, Risk and Audit work.  If they cut budgets to people like me, what are they going to do?

So would someone please think of the consultants?

* I have just wondered what the origin of this phrase is and have just looked it up.  The Yahoo answer seems to be one of those typical examples of why you have to be careful when using the net a source of information, there are almost half a dozen explanations of the origin of the phrase.  Most of them seem like BS.  I do like the Wiki.Answers explanation the best.  And I am wondering who on earth these people are who have never heard the phrase ‘blue murder’ and think that it’s a corruption of ‘bloody murder?’  What rock have you been hiding under?

Obviously I am in favour of the second system – with some safeguards – but to be honest I have found it hard to support many of the people who advocate it in political debates that I’ve attended.  They just don’t seem to be very compassionate or generous people.  If someone is going to advocate that people should give privately instead of allowing the government to inefficiently direct their funds, possibly towards causes that they do not support, they should be practicing what they preach.  If you’re not involved in and giving to rotary, a church group (or equivalent for your faith), volunteering for community organisations, helping with drug arm or soup kitchens, giving money to worthy causes, wearing legacy pins, reading the Big Issue, attending charity balls and fund raising functions and promoting awareness about your causes, then don’t tell me people will give privately to fund welfare.  And note that it would be wrong to include political and lobbying organisations in this.  At present most donations charitable organisations are actually tax deductable, up to $200 without receipts and more with them.  And when you think about it, if you’re on the highest tax rate of over 40%, then you’re getting almost half of the money you give back.  If you really believe in private charity, what’s stopping you?

I do have several problems with the socialist model as well.  For a start, government doing anything is an extremely inefficient way to achieve your end.  The government does actually take a fairly high portion in overheads.  Conservative estimates say that every $1 taken by the government would be approximately equal to $1.20 left in people’s pocket – so there is a minimum 20% premium to having the government organise any sort  of charity or welfare.  As most charitable organisations operate with skeleton staff and work to maximise what they do with limited resources, an additional 20% premium would go a long way to keeping people off the streets, or delivering meals to the elderly or even setting up community sports facilities.  Having our taxes taken, is done at arms length, and it’s allocation is done at an even more removed degree by a process that is baffling, confusing and quite frankly tedious for most of us.  The problem with it, is that it means that charity and looking after people in our community suddenly does not become our responsibility or even our concern.  The government is mean to take care of people, so why would we care if the parents of a child with cancer can not arrange treatment, that mentally ill people are sleeping in our streets or that there is little help for drug addicts to come clean?  To be honest I think that government intervention makes us less compassionate and concerned for others and that is never a good thing – we should all feel compassion for our fellow human beings and those in a position to help should often be moved to do so rather than be hardened with excuses.

One thing that amazes me about how society has changed over the years, even the recent years, is our lack of engagement in charity and volunteer work.  150 years ago most women, except for the very poorest, did not work.  Rather than filling the time with shopping and papering and other self-indulgent activities as many people who do not have to work do now, women were expected to be heavily involved in charitable organisations.  Even during the world wars women were involved in making care packages for soldiers – even if it meant doing something as simple as knitting a pair of socks or baking a cake.  My grandmother’s generation was involved in all sorts of things usually surrounding the local church such as cooking for meals on wheels, visiting sick people, helping elderly people in their community.  My mothers generation were probably less involved and my generation is hardly engaged with community organisations at all.

I’m not going to suppose that I can solve the problem of Australia becoming so uncompassionate and charitable.  I think that it is a complex problem and a solution will involve the government – either though less involvement or providing incentives to become involved.  But potentially getting it right could actually transform our society and make small government possible.

Initially I thought her music was interesting from a post modern perspective.  Media constructs including music are full of complex social cues that allow us to make predictions, understand their message and interpret them in the greater social context.  The instrumentals of Allen’s music seem to be more folksy, poppey or even a bit retro.  The message is not one that is consistent with this.  It turns our social cues on their head.

But then in the news she came out a little bit critical of Britain’s got talent sensation Susan Boyle.  Not that there was anything wrong with her having an opinion of the performers in the show, but it just seemed a little catty.  After all the only thing that makes here stand out from the myriad of other pop singers is that she sings in her chavy accent and her message is different.

But it was finally today that I was listing to her song charmingly named “F*** You.”  It really is quite nasty.  I’m not entirely sure that, “we hate you and your whole crew” is a message I particularly want to hear on the rare occasions I listen to the radio.  If it wasn’t so catchy I’m sure it would be seen as fairly despicable.  But the fact that the instrumental is quite catchy and bordering on childish made me realise that what she does is not post modern and clever, it’s actually quite childish.  Is someone who was teased quite a bit at school I was subject to a lot of taunts, including many in song.  What she’s doing is actually quite sad and pathetic – essentially she has not grown up from school yard taunts and bullying.

So Lily Allen, you sound like a bully.  And as someone who is reinforcing hate messages, I no longer like you or what you stand for.

But this quiz on gener and science was more interesting...

http://www.abc.net.au/science/games/quizzes/2009/sexbattle/

One of the things that I believe is that the free market is actually more efficient and better for consumers than government control.  I also know that as almost all governments have a propensity to become fat bloated bureaucracies by accumulating people who do not facilitate service delivery, they are the most expensive way to run something.  (That being said I know some very wonderful, very competent people in the public service who do help to deliver better community services).  Be it a school, a hospital or a rail network.  Now I’m not saying the government should not provide a safety net of public services, they certainly should, but it is better that we have private service providers and that  they should be governed by a minimum of regulations (because I can not think of many cases where a politician or a bureaucrat knows more about how to run something well than an industry expert or business leader).  So that being said it’s actually a good thing when assets that can be privatized are sold off.  Telstra is a great example.  There is absolutely no way that telecommunications still need to be run by a government.  In fact when Telstra was sold off we had some strong competitors in the industry who were then and still are offering better deals than Telstra.  And now that they’ve changed their chairman they stand to become a dynamic competitive organization, rather than one that still thinks and acts like a monopoly.

I have no problem with Bligh selling off rail networks and ports.  In fact the rail network being sold is for coal.  I am surprised the service is offered by QR at all as most of the mining companies I have come across professionally actually have their own rail networks that take product straight to their ports.  It’s more efficient than using or waiting for a government service.  Ports I can not comment on in a similar manner, but most of their management is now automated and done privately, it makes little difference that the government owns it and it may actually be better that a private organization makes important decisions like when to expand.  Many of our ports were stretched beyond capacity in the recent past and production has not been cut so significantly by the economic down turn that this problem is alleviated.

Critics do say that the government may not get the prices they are asking due to current market conditions.  And this may be the case – but what it will also mean is that the Queensland Treasury will need to take a long hard look at their asset valuation.  If they are valuing assets at more than they could be sold for, then potentially the Queensland Government is making financial misstatements in their Annual Reports.  Not being in government I don’t know what the penalty for that is, but in the private sector you’d be in a world of trouble.  Especially if you have shareholders.

My one other thought, to get the best of both worlds would be for the government to lease out the management of their assets for a fixed period.  That way they would still own the asset, get income from it and would be able to downsize the part of their workforce currently responsible for the running of their assets.  But that may be too complicated an idea for Andrew Fraser to understand.

I just read this as a link that was posted on the Freakonomics blog.  It is eye opening and distrubing - well worth a read.

http://tinyurl.com/r8dfzj

In recent times the press has actively propagated the idea that some things possibly shouldn’t be on Medicare.  That if someone quite clearly has a habit that they shouldn’t partake in, then they should not be asking for public money.  However the more I think about it, the more I realize that regardless of whether you think smokers or the obese only have themselves to blame, the premise of the issue is wrong.

Medicare is a general health net there to benefit all Australians.  And all working Australians contribute equally and as such should be entitled to claim upon it based on their own needs.  Medicare, or even our hospital system funded by our GST has not been set up to treat or not treat specific illnesses – purely cosmetic procedures seem to be the only thing really excluded – it’s there for everyone who needs it.  The point is to ensure that all Australians have a high standard of living, regardless of their living habits.  As we are being taxed specifically for our health system (ie the Medicare levy) I would say that under the current system we are entitled to healthcare for anything making us sick.  And just incase anyone with a very far right view is reading, this is separate to the issue of whether the government should provide health care at all.  

Medicare premiums are set based on how much you earn, they are not based on specific risk profiles of those covered – it does not work like an insurance premium in that respect, and even our health insurance system does not work like that either.  My insurance premium is not lower for not smoking or higher for being overweight.  Equally if the government did not offer health assistance to those who do smoke, or eat too much, or take drugs, or indulged in binge drinking or required treatment as a result of any other issue, it wouldn’t mean that the half a dozen people in the country who have never smoked, drunk, taken drugs, over eaten or engaged in any sort of risky behavior have to pay any less in the way of Medicare premiums.

The other problem I have with these debates is that it comes back to government policy being applied to people based on morality.  Just like I think that it is wrong to pick on ‘the rich’ in terms of government penalties because they are painted as greedy, immoral, cut throat etc, it is wrong to pick on people because they smoke or have poor eating habits.  It is pronouncing a moral judgment on them.  It also seems to be based on the premise that people indulge in bad habits because they want to and they can stop any time, which is not true.  Smoking, for example, is highly addictive and people start smoking for a variety of reasons and find it hard to stop for a variety of reasons.  Poor eating habits come down to either being uneducated about food – I think until you are taught as an adult very few people really understand how all the kilojoules, fat, salt and sugar content indicators on food really makes sense – or not being psychologically equipped to exercise self control when it comes to food.  Equally if you put the shoe on the other foot, no one would ever advocating denying medical treatment to anorexics of bulimics, but over eating is just as much of an eating disorder and psychological problem.  There are also some other bad habits I listed above that have not become the media’s punching bag just yet.  People take illicit drugs by choice, why don’t we deny treatment for people with drug problems and part of the reason for that is when people have drug problems it affects their whole community.

 The other point I wanted to make, but will not go into depth about, is that the government really does nothing to educate adults.  And I think that other than some TV advertising there seems to be an attitude that adults can not be educated.  For Christmas I gave my dad Jamie Oliver’s Ministry of Food cookbook.  In it Oliver explains that during the war, so people knew how to eat well on their rations the government trained up women to go into every community group in the country and conduct cooking lessons – they were in schools, women’s groups, men’s clubs, churches and all sorts of places.  And people learned how to eat well and use their rations.  So if we need to educate people as part of preventative health we can, although society is much more fragmented now and people are less involved with community groups – especially as we have more singles and often both partners in a relationship work.  But this is a secondary point.

At the end of the day all of us have vices, all of us do things that are bad for our health both now and in the future.  It may be a bad habit, it may be several, it may be working in a job that puts pressure on our bodies or does not allow us to exercise sufficiently, it may be letting ourselves get stressed too much or it may simply be that we neglect ourselves and don’t see a doctor or allied health professional as soon as we notice a problem.  As some point we all contribute to our own need for medical attention in the future, and even though some do so more than others, under a universal health scheme we are all entitled to seek help and have the very best service and the greatest number of options possible.  We should never even think to exclude others from the system the have contributed towards.

US Cheese is disgusting, it’s like eating wax.  They need to work on the texture, the flavour and add more salt.  US bread is full of sugar – ew.  Mexican food is everywhere.  If you replaced most of the Indian/Thai/Vietnamese restaurants here with Mexican food, that’s what it’s like.  Not good for someone who can not eat chilli, pepper of capsicum and generally needs good food hygiene and high fibre to ensure their system works as it should.  McDonalds (Mickey D’s) does not have the healthy options in the US.  KFC also serves grilled chicken now.

TV – US TV has 10 times as many ads as ours.  Most of the programming is trashy rubbish featuring people that should not be allowed outside their homes.  They do not have all the cool shows, they mostly have rubbish ones.

People – Generally Americans are kinder, friendlier, more chivalrous and more laid back than Australians.  This time I have realised that Australians are not laid back, we are nervous, hung up and irritable.  We also have no respect for property – I saw occasions where stuff would have been stolen in Australia where it was fine in the US and even though I stayed in a bad neighbourhood in LA, there was no graffiti.  People obviously have more respect for each other and their environment in the US.

Driving – it’s not so hard do it on the other side of the road.  However LA drivers are possibly the worst in the developed world.  Driving a 40 mile stretch of road twice in one day I saw more than half a dozen accidents and countless near misses.  I had a guy from the LA office take me around for a bit and panicked that we were going to get hit at least 3 times in as many hours.

Cleanliness – everything is automated in every US public toilet – flushes, soap dispensing, water, paper towels.  You’d really have to be an idiot to have poor hygiene there.  We may need to consider bringing this in.  Also Chicago is one of the cleanest places I have been to after Japan.  I have no idea how they do it, but I wish we would.  Possibly we need to start teaching people to show more respect for each other by respecting their environment (see my point on people).

Town Planning – Most of the East Coast cities in the US are big and efficient.  Our town planners need to learn from this so that as Australia gets bigger and more population dense, we have the infrastructure to cope.  LA is the opposite, it’s a decentralised mess.  But at least they have good road infrastructure and cheap parking (did not see parking anywhere in the US that cost less than $10 for a day).  I can not believe that we still have one lane highways.

Unlike many Liberals, I actually liked that the government was finally increasing the aged pension allowance.  I think differently about the aged pension to other forms of welfare as it is often claimed by people who have worked hard and contributed both to their country and to the government by paying tax.  I know it's not categorically the case, but it would seem that it is generally the case.  It's also a boost for people whose retirement savings were not quite adequate - not every one with super is smart enough to invest it in a savvy manner.  And there are many people out there who would have no idea what impact the current financial crisis would have on their retirement.

The thing that I was extremely disappointed with was the increase in retirement age.  Not so much from the perspective of people being able to claim the aged pension, but because it flows on to when individuals can also claim their superannuation.  At the moment the average retirement age is actually in the late 50's and as the age at which most of us can claim our super increases we have to rely on our personal savings more to retire early.  That's not particularly fair as superannuation money really constitutes part of our personal property and there really shouldn't be a lot of restrictions regarding accessing our own personal property.  If anything the retirement age should come down.

To add to the idea of decreasing the retirement age, I've pasted an article here with a comment from the CFMEU regarding why they don't agree with the increase in age for pension eligibility - some people just can't physically work in their jobs until they are 65 let alone 67 or 68.  I've seen this first hand with my father who has been a blue collar worker his whole life.  At the moment his body is literally breaking down with a gamete of health problems and he has to consider what he will do until he can retire.  Making him continue to work would just be cruel and making him work in a different job is just absurd (he has no other skills and is unlikely to pass even the most basic physical).  And yet it will still be a long wait until he can claim his superannuation.  If he was poorly paid it would be a long wait to claim the aged pension instead.  So I do see that there is wisdom in what the CFMEU says.  However, given that the current government may, yet again, view this in terms of class warfare, we run the risk of having different sets of rules for people coming from different occupations.  And that would also be quite wrong.  Welfare is nothing to do with class, it exists so that our poor and unfortunate do no starve in the streets or become completely neglected as they rely on others to care for them.

To preface my next point I will say that I see the unions and their governing body the ACTU as a branch of the Labor party.  Both because of their financial contributions and their influence on policy. 

It is disappointing to see after less than a term in office there are already cracks appearing in the unity of the ALP government.  Whilst they are generally lauded for the despicable behaviour of only voting along party lines, it would seem that they are not making decisions that are satisfactory or even in consultation with all of their key backers and stake holders.  Given how many ALP parliamentarians come from some sort of union background, you'd think that they would consult them when it came to policy!  But the unions are unhappy with the current changes to IR laws, they are unhappy with financial matters, they are unhappy with public sector wages. 

But I digress from my point that if anything, the retirement age should decrease.  At the end of the day there should actually be more freedom for people to choose when they wish to retire!

Rise in pension age will create false economy: CFMEU

01 June 2009 | Content provided to you by AAP.

CANBERRA, June 1 AAP - The federal government's proposal to raise the pension age from 65 to 67 will cost money - not save it - two major Australian unions say. Labor says the measure is necessary to fund an increase in the aged pension rate. But Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union national secretary John Sutton says the move will create a false economy. "I anticipate a hell of a lot of injuries and a hell of a lot of downtime, and I don't see where that would actually make money for employers or the commonwealth," he told ABC Radio on Monday. Many union members had been engaged in hard labour since their teens and would find it difficult to keep working beyond 65. "By the time you reach 65 you've basically done about 50 years in hard physical labour," he said. "To be turning around and saying to people that, `I'm sorry, they're not going to get the aged pension. They've got to work on to age 67,' is a pretty big ask." The CFMEU and the Australian Manufacturing Workers' Union have written to Prime Minister Kevin Rudd asking him to dump the legislation announced as part of the May budget.

© 2009 AAP | Disclaimer

When I arrived in the US the week before last there were a few reports on Swine Flu, but their news media was pretty much over it and their government didn’t really care.  They realised, as I knew before leaving, that it was a very mild form of the flu and more people die from other strains.

Needless to say I was really, really surprised when I got back to not be allowed to disembark until some bureaucrat from the Australian government in a mask boarded the plane and walked up one of the aisles looking for goodness knows what and I also had to fill out a health declaration.  Now I’m back and have seen the news I am in absolute disbelief that the government is reacting the way it is to a relatively mild strain of flu.  We have advertising, reported counts of people infected (labelled as a ‘toll’) and a ship of harmless holiday makers quarantined off the coast.

This flu is less harmful than normal flu.

And yet there is no mention that people with other strains of flu are going to be forced to stay at home and wear masks and take other precautions.  Really if we are going to make a big deal about an innocuous disease, have nightly updates on the news, and have health resources activated and devoted to preventing the spread of the disease.

But that’s not going to happen.

The only explanation that I can think of is that the government is manufacturing a situation that they want to seen to be taking care of – a problem that has been solved by our powers that be.  The only problem is that it’s not a real problem that needs to be solved.  The housing crisis, rising unemployment, Indigenous disadvantage, traffic problems, criminal activity, mental illness, rising drug use, incompetent hospital doctors, fire ants, infrastructure that is not able to carry demand for it’s use (ie rail, ports, water) are all real problems.  Many can be solved by government action, others better dealt with by less government action, but the are all things that the government can do something about.  Swine Flu is something that the government can do little about and that both the Commonwealth and state governments are wasting money on and quite frankly the public and press apathy seems quite palpable.

So if any level of government drags their handling of swine flu out at any point as an achievement, please, for the love of all that’s good, punish them at the polls and in the mean time in your responses to blogs, letters to the paper and talkback.

The trip to Disneyland was relatively short but it was hard to find!  The signs weren’t that great and my GPS seemed not to be able to find the entrance (which you can’t drive to) or the car park.  Disneyland is so well organised their designers should design cities!  You pay and drive in, are directed to a park on the highest level closest to the escalators.  You then go down to a tram that takes you to ‘Downtown Disneyland.’  Downtown had some sort of food and wine exhibit (sadly closed by the time I left), some food outlets and more Disney stores.  We then had the choice of going to Disneyland, Disney’s California Adventure or both.  Would people really choose Disney’s California Adventure over Disneyland?

I walked into Disneyland and it was a little different to Tokyo Disney (my obvious bench mark), I don’t remember the big row of stores on the walk into Tokyo Disney.  However they were well placed as I needed to get a hat.  I didn’t have a hat the previous day on my visit to Hollywood in the open top bus and whilst my skin was fine, my scalp had burned making it feel like I’d hit my head!  I also found a great souvenir for my dad – Snow White and the Seven Dwarves themed merchandise featuring Grumpy.  I made a bee line to get a Fast Pass for a couple of rides but was disappointed to find out that in the US you can only hold one at a time!  I hit the big rides first – Splash Mountain (log ride with Brer Rabbit), Indiana Jones (same as Disney Sea in Tokyo – waste of time), the train ride (forget the name) and then visited the Haunted Mansion before heading to Tomorrowland.  On the way I found an area where little girls were made up as princesses – parents could pay to get their hair and make up done as well as have costumes thrown into the deal.  It was a little over the top, but in the interest of being inclusive little boys could get made over as pirates or princes.  I then headed to Space Mountain – I’d forgotten how awesome this roller coaster is.  It’s completely in the dark with tiny lights that don’t give you a clue of what’s coming next.  I then finally got on the Star Tours – I’d been looing for the Star Wars ride and forgotten what it was called – which is the simulated roller coaster.  When you get out there is a shop full of very cool Star Wars stuff including a wookie back pack and life size replicas of Star Wars guns and helmets.  The other thing you can do is have a custom made light sabre, and they have pictures of different characters weapons for you to model them on.

I tried to get lunch in the New Orleans Quarter but there was nothing on any of the menus I could manage (ie no chilli, no pepper, no capsicum) and ended up having a hot dog back near the entrance in despair.  Ew.  But I did have a rag time pianist to play whilst eating and I got to see a little ‘princess’ decide the best way to manage her food was to put her face in her dish and eat that way – Princess school really worked!

I was tired by this point, and overwhelmed by fighting my way through a see of people and more bizarrely parked prams.  I originally thought that going on a Monday = less school children before I realised that the Monday was a public holiday.  I made it to the Pirates of the Caribbean ride, which was a bit different to the one in Tokyo, and also due to the popularity of the movie they had added in some robotic ‘Jack Sparrow’ figures to the ride as well as Davey Jones.  From there I got to explore sleeping beauty’s castle, watch the Jedi training school and see the  3D movie, “Honey I Shrunk the Audience.”  I also got on the jungle cruise at some point where  you go on a boat with a guide and manage to visit Cambodia, the Nile, Africa, the Amazon and then head back to Africa all without leaving the one jungle…  …very culturally aware!  I headed off at about 5.  I didn’t want to leave too early as my flight was not until 11pm.

I finally returned my car, got to the airport and spent hours waiting around before flying 12 hours back to Brisbane!

I then headed to Hollywood Boulevard’s Kodak theatre where I knew I could see the walk of fame, a variety of other Hollywood stuff and decide if I wanted to do a studio tour or a tour of the stars houses.  I went for the tour of the stars houses – and it was a long tour!  2 hours of Beverley Hills and Hollywood.

We started off through Hollywood and one of our turn offs was in front of the chicken place where Brad Pitt first worked in a chicken outfit.  We headed up past some hotels and the Beverly Hills town hall (the spire is gold plated) and headed into Beverly Hills.  Our tour guide pointed out that the fire hydrants were not sliver but platinum in colour (could have fooled me) and that the Beverly Hills Streets had alternating skinny then fat palm trees to make the place look much more like a luxurious paradise.  We headed down Rodeo Drive, first of all past some quite interesting houses.  Apparently their planning laws prevent two of the same or similar houses being built on the one street – if only that principle was applied in housing estates here.  We also went past all the designer shops – there are seriously no small, boutique or cheap stores here!  All big name designers.  The one exception was the boutique used to film Pretty Woman, which looked decidedly shabby against the other stores.  At the end of the street was a palatial hotel, also used for Pretty Woman.  We then headed to the Spelling house, which is currently on sale for $150million.  But that will buy you 125 rooms and an ice skating rink and goodness knows what else.  The next stop was the Playboy Mansion.  One of the louder guys in our group tried to greet a girl walking in the back entrance who gave him a dirty look.  We also got to see houses from quite a few celebs including Gene Simmonds, Simon Cowell, Snoop Dog, Shaquile O’Neil, Bob Barker, the Beverley Hillbillies house, Will Farrell’s driveway, Orlando Bloom’s place, Brad Pitt’s house, the Beckham’s home, Dr Phil, Michael Jackson, Janet Jackson, Elvis’ former residence, Harrison Ford’s house from a distance, the home of the original Dracula (forget the actor’s name) and many, many others.  All I can say is, celebrity houses and others, we do not have wealth like that in Australia!  Amusing was the woman on the side of the street selling star maps.  I’m not actually sure that it was a woman due to the drag queen like make up!  But perhaps she just didn’t want to look shabby if George Clooney dropped by.  We went back along Sunset and saw a liquor store that was remodelled after Halle Berry ran though the front of it, some music joints that have launched many a famous band, the comedy clubs and The House of Blues that is part owned by one of the Blues Brothers (can’t remember if it was John Belushi before he died or Dan Ackroyd) and they spend millions to make it look like a shack.  We also headed to a street that is used in almost every film as it looks like it could be a street in almost any part of the US – and was notably used to film Halloween and Father of the Bride.  We also headed up to a lookout where we could see the Hollywood sign.  Apparently it use to say Hollywood Land and was built by a real estate agent!

At the end I found out that we were expected to tip our driver as she earns minimum wage, but as the tour was already $30 (discounted), I hated giving up another $15 (as per the tipping guide’s recommendation for a great tour, which it was).

After all that I had lunch in the shopping centre attached to the Kodak Theatre at a lovely Italian joint and was about to head back to the hotel when I decided to chance it and head to La Brea Tar Pit Museum.  Just so I could say I did something cultural.  It was close to my hotel and some other galleries and museums.  I had forgotten this place was in LA until I looked at the discoverlosangeles.com website the night before.  The La Brea tar pits have yielded the largest deposits of stone age fossils in the world.  I only had 15 mins to take some happy snaps of the mastodons, bison, mammoths, sabre tooth tigers and wolves on display.  There were also some animatronics models and real life palaeontologists at work behind glass.  I’d love to have had more time to browse all that was on offer.

That evening I had intended to go to church, a comedy club or even a movie after a nap, but ended up chatting online to R and my mother.  I missed them both for completely different reasons!

I woke up early after a poor night’s sleep.  After a night of sirens I was greeted by dump trucks taking away the rubbish.  Looking out my window I noticed that I’d woken up before the two homeless men sleeping outside my hotel.

I was able to get online and chat with R, who was up quite late.  The time difference between LA and Brisbane is huge!

I was so hungry and after stopping off at three local delis to find that they were closed I headed straight for Santee Alley, in the heart of what I had found online to be called the fashion district.  I also remembered online that it mentioned that there were some good eating places.  I got there and was quite disappointed.  The place reminded me of the Ekka for some reason – just the dirt, the smell and the people peddling crap.  There were hot dog and taco stands everywhere.  Most of the vendors were (I assume) Mexican and Spanish speaking.  In fact I would say most of the vendors and also the retailers were spruiking in Spanish as a preference and English if they saw someone white.  The place was kind of dirty, and I was not overly impressed with the quality of the merchandise on sale.  Not just in terms of how well it was produced, but also most of the styles were kind of trashy.  That being said I did still find a couple of nice tops for myself in one store.  Apparently the manager had a lot of Australians and Kiwis come in – I suspect the fashion district has some how found a way to get higher hits on Google Australia than US.  Eventually I gave in and went to MacDonalds for breakfast – not a choice I relished.  I’m reluctant to give a US Bacon and Egg muffin with no cheese a while 4 points – the bacon was tiny and the eggs were quite clearly powdered.  We seem to get a much better deal here in Oz, even if it is a bit more expensive.

I then gave in and did what one of the guys from the LA office had suggested and headed for some brand name outlets.  I’d looked on line and the Premium Outlets at Camarillo had got quite a few write ups as a good place to go if you’re in LA.  I punched the address into my GPS and headed off expecting it to take about 35 minutes.  It took over an hour.  First of all the place was miles and miles and miles away and secondly LA drivers CAN NOT FREAKING DRIVE.  Every time traffic had to merge there was a traffic jam.  That and even at 11am on a Saturday morning there was still as much traffic as Brisbane’s peak hour.  I hate to think of what peak hour is like (but if I don’t leave early enough tomorrow morning I suspect I will find out).  There were so many cars stopped and crashed on the side of the road and so many near misses I saw, that I have since adopted a policy of just getting out of every one’s way.  That being said LA drivers are much nicer about letting people in and much less aggressive than Australian drivers.  They actually break when someone steps out into the road and don’t honk you unless you really are about to hit them.

On the way to Camarillo I got to see some of the countryside to the North of LA.  There are some quite spectacular mountains/hills but it is very very arid.  When I finally got there I was not disappointed. Camarillo is a modern, up market place and the outlet stores had so many name brands I couldn’t believe my eyes.  They were also all carrying genuinely discounted merchandise, most of which was further discounted for Memorial Day Sales (Memorial Day is the US equivalent of ANZAC day – the TV has been flooded with stuff about troops, charities for returned service people etc).  I picked up some stuff for myself and a few gifts.

On the way back I’d arranged to meet up with a senior from the LA office I met on training.  Another Australian girl and I had spent a bit of time chatting to him and he seemed lovely.  Sadly because of the traffic all I had time to do was throw on a new top and we were off again.  This time we went to Little Tokyo (or J-Town as he called it) for sushi.  As the really good sushi place wasn’t open for half an hour I took some time to explore the area I had read about online.  It was a bit disappointing with a few paved in walls, some Japanese themed retailers and restaurants and very little else.  Fortunately the sushi was extremely good and more than made up for it.  The quality of the sashimi they used for the sushi was amongst some of the best I’ve had.

We then tried to head to Griffith Park to view the Hollywood sign, but there was a Sanata concert in the Hollywood bowl and we couldn’t get a park.  We then headed to Sunset Boulevard to check out the shops and clubs where the beautiful people hang out.  I was surprised how reasonably priced some of the eateries were.  We got gelato at a place I made a mental note of to go back to for breakfast as I’d had trouble finding somewhere near my hotel.  Then at my hosts insistence we headed to a club.  He doesn’t drink so I wasn’t big on drinking and making him my designated driver but then he suggested WeHo (West Hollywood) and it sounded like fun.  Parking was so hard to find, especially as apparently no one in LA catches a cab let alone public transport, especially to go out!

We went to Abbey – which I am informed is one of the spots Paris Hilton goes to – it was a fun place and the napkins were printed with:

Do you like me?

[ ] yes

[ ] no

[ ] maybe

My number is ________________.

Guess there’s not pretending as to what they are encouraging patrons to do!

I then tried to get to sleep when I got back and had trouble as yet again my neighbour had his or her TV up loud.  I asked the front desk to request they turn it down – but even though they called twice and Security knocked on the door there was no answer.  Fortunately the accommodated my request to move my room as there was no way I was going to go without sleep again.