A column about Björk

Every time I try to book tickets online, I grit my teeth and remember how ironic it is that the internet was supposed to make our lives more convenient. Because whenever Sydney decides en masse that a certain event is must-see, then good luck getting tickets. It happened for the Ashes Test last summer, to the irritation of those who loyally go every year and couldn't get in because of the influx of the trendies. And it happened, to my huge irritation, with the Big Day Out this year.

I know, you'd think that the organisers would have been falling over themselves to give me freebies to ensure good coverage in the pages of The Glebe. But no. And when I tried to slum it by booking them online, I couldn't. And I was furious, especially since I'd probably missed out to a Hilltop Hoods fan. (Yes, apparently they have them – and yes, I'm as shocked as you are.) All I can say is that I was disappointed and angered, and that the only way the BDO can possibly make it up to me is free tickets, and my own hospitality tent.

Even worse was the process for Splendour in the Grass, that hippyish festival they have up in Byron in the middle of winter, which had a little animation of a virtual ticket queue. After an hour, virtual me neared the front, only to find that it had sold out. I was left wishing there was some way I could have taken the easy option and sat out in the freezing cold overnight, like we used to do as teenagers. At least in those days you knew that if you queued for long enough, you'd get a ticket. Now, there are no guarantees. The internet isn't designed for massive spikes of traffic like when tickets go onsale, and there are tens of thousands of people simultaneously clicking 'refresh'. It may have originally been designed for the US military in wartime, but no soldiers have the dedication of an army of emaciated Goths trying to get to a music festival.

So I wasn't confident when I tried to book tickets to Björk’s gig at the Sydney Festival. There were only 5000 tickets for one of the most famous ‘alternative’ performers in the world singing in the forecourt of the Opera House on what will in all probability be a blissful, idyllic summer night, and people have been talking about it for months. Tickets went onsale at 9am on a Friday, and I logged onto Ticketek at what my computer assured me was the dot of 9. No dice. Sure, it said tickets were available, tantalising me, but when it actually went off to have a look, it blithely suggested that the event must have sold out. As at literally 9:01am.

I was astounded. Björk’s last two or three albums have been widely perceived as unlistenable twaddle, and the first few weren’t exactly accessible unless you have a partiality to the sound of Icelandic- accented yowling cats. Which, as it happens, I do.

Still, the Sydney Festival site had said the Opera House had tickets as well, so I tried there. The site was so busy that it wouldn't even let me in. I kept trying, and trying, and by 9.45, it seemed everyone else had given up and I breezed through the booking in no time. Everyone with any sense had obviously abandoned hope, and my foolish persistence paid off. Finally, a crashing ticket website had actually worked in my favour.

The real problem, though, is this city's mob mentality when it comes to big summer events. Sure, Tropfest's fun, even if most of the movies aren't – but do we all have to go? And as for Field Day, the New Year's Day dance party, you can't tell me everyone in the Domain is actually enjoying the music. Half of them are in such a state of chemical bliss that we could bundle them into Parliament House next door and they'd still be grooving along, with idiotic grins on their faces, to the phat beats in their heads. Which would make way for those of us who might actually have a chance of dancing in time with the beat.

I always get the impression that most Sydneysiders spends January rushing from event to event, terrified that they'll miss the must-see event of the summer. People, you need to relax. Maybe you should try staying home, and having a lovely backyard barbie? Why not put your feet up, eh? Specifically on days when I want to get tickets.

A column about the Federal election

Finally, after nearly a year since Kevin Rudd was elected and it all began in earnest, we have an end date for the seemingly interminable campaigning: 24 November. On that night, the cycle will begin again, either with the same old leadership or Labor’s new old leader, who offers almost identical policies but has a much snazzier website.

I’ve been looking forward to this election since Rudd’s arrival. Sure, I’m a politics nerd – heck, I found some interest even in the Beazley contests. But Rudd is a real contender, finally Howard’s match when it comes to sheer political professionalism. He rarely puts a foot, or even a hair, wrong. Watching him on the 7.30 Report the other night, I was struck by his remarkable capacity to string soundbites and talking points together so seamlessly that they almost sound like actual human conversation. He never ums or ahs – in sharp distinction to John Howard – and if he’s interrupted midway through a sentence, he simply takes a moment and then starts off where he was, delivering the perfect soundbite in such a way that it will clip nicely into the evening news.

In short, if an evil genius were to design a political robot, it would probably look a lot like Kevin Rudd. Okay, so perhaps not physically – very few people would choose to outfit themselves quite so prissily. But in terms of its almost flawless message discipline, it could do worse than derive its programming directly from Rudd’s own neurones.

Even Rudd’s policies could have been designed by computer. And the program is simple. Take the Government’s positions, test them with focus groups and tweak the formula ever so slightly so that they’ll like them just that little bit more than Howard’s version. And, crucially, still deliver nearly everything that the original policy that appealed to Coalition voters. Kevin07 is very much a subtle evolution, not revolution – whatever he may have chosen to term his education policy.

His tax plan, which was just released as I was finishing this column, is the perfect example. Rudd will deliver nearly all of the enormous tax cuts Howard announced at the start of the campaign, but hold a little back from the very top income earners – who probably weren’t going to vote for him anyway. He’ll use that $3 billion or so to give families a tax credit for investment on education, and to reduce waiting times for elective surgery.

See what he did? He knows that most voters are into health and education, as long as they don’t have to pay for it with high taxes. So he slightly skews Howard’s package to invest a small amount in these areas, so he can claim he’s more in touch with working families than the Coalition. Another of Rudd’s favourite soundbites that we’ve been hearing since he was elected last December is that Howard is a “clever politician”. But when it comes to tricky political calculations, Rudd’s evidently no slouch either.

And that, ultimately, is what’s starting to infuriate me in 2007, a mere week into the campaign. It’s all tinkering at the margins. Neither party has any real ideas to make our society better, or fairer, or nicer. They just want to push our buttons so we’ll elect them. Principle has long gone from the Labor Party, except when it comes to delivering for the unions that fund and staff it. And John Howard achieved his wildest political dreams a year ago, and hasn’t had anything new to say since. Well, except on reconciliation. So he hasn’t had anything credible and new to say since.

I’m left harking back to the days when there were radical differences between the parties, and bold ideas. Sure, there were some disasters. But look at something like Medicare, which is so popular that neither party dare touch it. No-one would even attempt to create something like that now. All they’d do is offer the status quo, or the status quo packaged with trendy buzzwords and a little Web 2.0 pizzazz. And sure, this reflects that Australia is an affluent place for most of us. But not all of us. But you’ll never hear about that during this campaign. Not while there are $34 billion in tax cuts to distribute to people who already have it all. Sorry, or $31 billion if we vote Labor. An enormous difference.

When John Howard was elected in 1996, his slogan was “For All Of Us”. Of course, that isn’t how it panned out. But back in the day, politicians used to at least pretend they wanted to help life’s unfortunates. Not any more. Now, the Coalition is Going For Growth, and Labor is following closely behind them. But it doesn’t say much for our society that our grandest aspiration is a little more for ourselves.

A column about summer

As you know, this column is highly influential in world affairs. Rarely a major incident occurs on the world stage without my counsel proving in some way decisive. Many have likened me to Henry Kissenger, while some have even dubbed me The Glebe’s own Nelson Mandela. And while of course I’m flattered by such comparisons, I’m just doing my job.

Even as you read this, Aung San Suu Kyi, General Than Shwe and thousands of imprisoned monks are all waiting for my considered deliberations on the situation in Myanmar. And I’d like to devote my full attention to that particular flashpoint, given its urgency. But I’m afraid I simply can’t apply the healing balm of my wisdom to that troubled region today, for one simple reason – this afternoon, the weather is nothing short of spectacular today.

Oh okay, I suppose I can spare them a paragraph before I get back to contemplating the loveliness of Sydney in the springtime. General, it’s high time you gave Aung a go, okay? It’s polite to share. And lay off the monks, it’s making you look bad. Not to mention Australian Federal Police, who trained your thugs. There. Now, where was I?

I’ve travelled through many other towns in my time (we UN peace envoys do tend to get about a bit) and they simply aren’t as good. Especially not Melbourne, and I do wish they’d stop going on about it.

For us Sydneysiders, it’s genuinely hard to care about the bad things that are happening in the world over summer. Take for example Kevin Andrews’ latest hideous decision to restrict migration from Africa. He justified it with a hideous list of generalisations about how Africans are poorly educated, join gangs and (shock horror) won’t integrate.

And that, apparently, is enough to deny genuine refugees – whose lives, let’s not forget, are in danger if they stay in their own countries – the chance to come and live in this earthly paradise of ours, and share the wonderful lifestyle we have enjoyed since the British essentially stole the entire continent. Frenzied leftists have often dubbed the Howard Government racist, but this seems like the most indisputable instance yet.

And yet, I can’t really find it in my heart to care all that much about it. As I wrote at about this time last year about global warming, it’s hard to get passionate about important causes in warm weather. I know I should be taking to the street, shouting angry slogans and making a genuine effort to smash something – probably the state. But what I most feel like doing is going for a swim. I’m sure the water’s lovely. Sure, I also think that Africans should be allowed to enjoy it alongside me, but that’s not going to stop me shutting the computer down and taking a dip.

And this, perhaps, is why John Howard keeps putting off the election. That, and the desperate hope that Kevin Rudd will suddenly develop pancreatitis or shatter some cabbie’s ulna. All of John Howard’s wins have been in the heat – in March, October or November. When we go to the polls on an idyllic day, it’s easy to see the appeal of the status quo.

If anyone out there is planning to foment revolution – and there surely aren’t many cells of communist revolutionaries out there, but I’d be willing to bet that any in existence are probably somewhere within the Inner West – I suggest they wait until midwinter. Because I’ll be happy to storm the barricades in June or July, especially if there’s any chance of guillotining Kevin Andrews, whose tenure as Immigration Minister is making Amanda Vanstone look competent and Phillip Ruddock seem caring. But right now, I’m busy thinking about what cocktail I’ll be ordering this evening. A mojito, I think. And while I’d love to share the Sydney summer with some Sudanese refugees and persecuted Burmese dissidents – in particular Aung San Suu Kyi, who seems like a bit of a spunk for a woman in her early 60s – the weather has turned warm, and it’s high time I put down the lethal weapon of political influence I call my laptop and went out to enjoy some of it.

A column about music videos

I have reached the age when I no longer understand popular music. I have always been a huge music fan, and am still buying CDs and trawling the internet obsessively to find new artists, but I have finally reached the point of total disconnection from the charts I used to collect from the record shops each week as a teenager.

A quick trawl through this week’s list only confirms this. The #1 song is Sean Kingston’s ‘Beautiful Girls’. Not only have I never heard the track, but I’ve never even heard of Kingston. There’s a new Kanye West song at #4 that I know – not only because I like West, but also because Daft Punk, who he samples, is more from my era. Further down the list, there are artists I’ve heard of, like P!nk (whose spelling seems to be more pretentious these days), the Foo Fighters and Ben Lee, but I don’t know any of their new songs. I could hum the songs by Avril Lavigne (I can’t believe that awful ‘Girlfriend’ is still in the charts – or even that it ever was), Sneaky Sound System, Justin Timberlake and Silverchair, but honestly, that’s about it. For a 30-year-old, that’s a truly pathetic effort.

This all came to a head recently in a creative meeting for the tv show I work on (The Chaser). One of the team pitched a sketch based on parodying what he said was one of the year’s biggest dance songs, a little ditty called ‘Destination Calabria’ by Alex Gaudino which is currently at #14 on the ARIA chart. And it would be fair to say that of the other five members of the team, not a single one of us had heard of it.

Not only have we never heard of it, but our team – which is supposed to be an edgy comedy collective, with no barriers and all that kind of rubbish – has universally agreed that it is one of the worst songs we’ve ever heard, and that we’ll never understand kids these days, and other fogeyish statements. Not that we are completely ancient, mind you – we are in our early 30s, and by Triple J announcer standards, that makes us practically children.

And I’ll defend my negative position, frankly. It sound like 90s retro with what little was good about the dance music of that era stripped away from it. The producer has made millions, I assume, merely by splicing a dull Crystal Waters track, ‘Destination Unknown’, with a synthesised saxophone riff from a song called ‘Calabria’. It sounds like that Guru Josh song ‘Infinity’, only if he was demoted to Acolyte Josh.

The sketch was intended to parody the ridiculous explicitness of the video clip, which features raunchy close-ups of bikini-clad models and their saxophones. (At this point, I bet more than one reader is saying “Oh, that song” to themselves.) The close-ups go far beyond gratuitous, to the point where the viewers of FHM TV voted it the sexiest video clip ever. And hey, they’d know.

My ignorance of “what the kids are listening to” has plenty of upside, like my good fortune to have missed virtually all of the career of Akon. But it still concerns me. So I have vowed to make sure I watch the chart shows every month or so. Even though I genuinely fear that I’ll hate virtually everything on them. But it’ll be worth it. I need to know that when a 19-year-old says they really love what Fergie’s done lately, they’re not talking about another toe-sucking episode.

Of course, I won’t keep it up. My definition of “hot new music” will continue to be whatever the artists I liked when I was 20, like Beck, have done lately. I will make the odd, token effort to expand my horizons, like the peculiar day my father came home with an Usher CD. But for the most part, it’s already game over for my knowledge of new music. Or, as Alex Gaudino might put it by means of a shamelessly misappropriated sample, I’m on my way to ‘Destination Uninformed’.

A column about APEC #2

When you were a kid, and one of your parents’ bosses came over for dinner, it was always a nightmare. Mum and dad spent days sprucing the place up, and fussing over details like which was the best set of china, and whether the boss’ wife ate fish.

As for the children, our behaviour was expected to be impractically exemplary, and even the smallest of infractions attracted massive, and quite disproportionate, retaliation. Even leaving a toy on the kitchen table two days before the big event would be enough to get you sent to your room immediately.

And what’s more, you were distinctly unwelcome at your parents’ function. A brief appearance was mandatory, where you would politely greet the guests, but then you were to retire to your room and make absolutely no noise whatsoever. If you indulged in a little attention-seeking behaviour that made one of them come upstairs, painful retaliation was practically guaranteed.

Well, that’s what APEC was like. John Howard wanted to impress the big boys, so we all had to be on our best behaviour. The police were charged with ensuring that the public were not seen and not heard, and woe betide anyone who wanted to bang some pots and pans together – or perhaps squirt a little tomato sauce around – while we had company.

The security made the Olympic arrangements look like a Little Athletics meeting. And sure, when you have the leaders of the three most powerful countries in the world in town, and two of them have been directly targeted by terrorists over Iraq and Chechnya, you’re going to need some kind of security presence.

But it was a mistake to transform our city into a ghost town with all of the endless barricades and dour, tense police. It was a far cry from the party atmosphere of Sydney 2000, when our visitors would have actually felt welcome. And whereas the Olympics concluded with a wonderful fireworks display that gave everyone a chance to mark the end of a previous period of inconvenience, we were told in no uncertain terms not to come to the APEC ones. The Government even gave us a treat to bribe us to stay away, in the form of a public holiday.

I’m sure it was all very efficient, but if we were looking to give our guests a taste of Sydney, we failed. Because while the leaders may have broken bread at the Opera House, and sent their partners off to Icebergs for swanky drinkies, the city that the region’s leaders sped through in their heavily protected convoys wasn’t the city we know and love. The public were kept at arm’s length, not encouraged to come and say hello. It was the artificial Sydney of the Matrix trilogy, not the open, friendly place we see on New Year’s Eve. And it left a sour taste in the mouth.

And what was it all for, exactly? Photo opportunities with Driza-Bones, and a few scant political achievements. John Howard cited the “Sydney Declaration” on climate change as the greatest achievement, but all that meant is that while Kyoto’s name is now associated with efforts to control global warming, Sydney’s will be synonymous with token attempts to brush it under the carpet. Getting the leaders to commit to non-binding “aspirational” targets is about as useful as when your parents’ dinner guests used to ask you what you’d like to be when you grew up. It’s cute, but ultimately meaningless.

Oh, and Australia scored two pandas out of it. But for Adelaide Zoo. Come on – we had to put up with all of that hassle, and South Australia gets the cute bears?

When your parents’ bosses come to dinner, the real justification is that mum and dad will be able to suck up, and perhaps advance their careers. Well, John Howard dropped in the polls on the last day of the meeting, and it seems he’s about to be fired by his real bosses, the people APEC kept away. So his big show didn’t work even on that level.

It’s appropriate that APEC be held in Australia’s major city, and a bit of inconvenience is fine. But if the people who are supposed to be our representatives are so desperately keen to keep us all away from our own home town, then I’d rather ma and pa Howard had taken their guests out somewhere else instead of inviting them home for a meal.

A column about Wikipedia

I’ve been fascinated to read that John Howard’s ministerial staff have been caught modifying entries on Wikipedia, the internet encyclopedia that anyone can edit. They were caught out by a new site called Wikiscanner site, which found that on June 28, someone from the Prime Minister’s Department modified Peter Costello’s entry to remove a reference to his nickname, “Captain Smirk”, which was very surprising, and not just because this seems improper behaviour for a public servant. I’d have thought someone working for John Howard would have wanted to add insulting material to Costello’s Wikipedia entry, not delete it.

But that’s not the most shocking thing about this news. Given John Howard’s general level of technological literacy, I’m surprised anyone in his office has heard of Wikipedia at all.

Some of the modifications were more overtly political, such as the softening of claims that the mandatory detention regime helped Howard win the 2001 election. These are the moments when Wikipedia can uncomfortably resemble George Orwell’s Ministry of Truth, where the past is constantly being rewritten to suit the political purposes of the present. But fortunately, Wikipedia is truly democratic, and for every one government drone trying to spin their employers’ history, there are dozens of other committed users who can reverse the damage.

One of the best things about the encyclopedia is that it keeps a record of everything, so you can tell exactly what was done. At which point I should mention, in the interests of bipartisanship, that some of Morris Iemma’s ministerial staff have done the same thing, deleting the mention of an incident where he called the CEO of the Cross-City Tunnel a f***wit on a microphone which had accidentally been left on. I’m surprised his flunkies bothered to do this – surely the comment would only have endeared him to voters?

Now the comment is intact, with a reference to the attempt to delete it – which, of course, makes him look even worse.

More amusing, though, were some of the ways the staff found to waste time at work. One tried to diss the Sydney Roosters by claiming that they "base their pride on things such as stealing players from other clubs and calling them their own, and cheating the NRL salary cap.

Thanks to Wikiscanner, we can look forward to many an egomaniac being caught out modifying their biographies to present themselves in a more favourable light. And it’ll be fantastic entertainment. Can you imagine, for instance, how many times Kevin Rudd must have changed his page? Or Kyle Sandilands? Stay tuned for more amusing revelations.

Th I myself (cough, cough) have been affected by Wikipedia vandalism. Yes, I am in possession of perhaps the briefest and dullest entry of the 100,000+ on the site. Which might suggest to some that my fame isn’t exactly considerable. Whereas I choose to believe that my legions fans are so devoted that they’d rather consult a more reliable source.

The only interesting thing that has ever happened to my Wikipedia entry was on 16 May this year, though, when someone actually bothered to vandalise it. Here’s what they inserted:

His childhood was particularly difficult. Born in 1937, Dom was born genetically female. At the young age of 11, he decided that he wanted to be male, and so had his name changed via deed poll from "Dominique Samantha" to "Dominic Sebastian". He was ostracised from his peers, and never attended high school as a result. After many years (largely spent goat-herding in Mongolia), he underwent sex-change surgery in 1984.

Mongolian goat-herding! Yep, pretty wacky stuff. But in all honestly, I’ve never been so flattered as when someone took five minutes out of their day to vandalise my page. I had expected that no-one would even notice, but amazingly, some other Wikipedian had reversed the edit a mere four hours later. And I expect no-one but me has looked at the page since.

Which reminds me – I must make a few edits. If you by any chance visit the page and see mentions of my “hilariously devastating wit” and “remarkable sexual prowess”, let them be, would you? Go vandalise John Howard’s page instead.

A column about APEC

It’s still a few weeks away, but I’m already over APEC. Whenever I’m in the city, scary-looking helicopters fly noisily overhead, and then there are those annoying ads everywhere. I can’t believe that this stupid summit has given the Federal Government yet another reason to waste money on expensive advertisements.

Preparations are well underway. And I must single out CityRail, who have done a wonderful job of preparing us for APEC by gradually lowering our expectations over the last few years. When they shut down several of the city’s train stations for the summit, most of us probably won’t even notice.

Originally, APEC seemed like a sweet deal, because we were going to be compensated for the inconvenience with a bonus public holiday. And I’m always happy to be bribed with vacations. But unfortunately that benefit is just about to be cancelled out, because President Bush has just announced he’s coming early. He’s coming early to spend some quality time hangin’ with his homie John Howard, probably for the last time while they’re both still in office. And I guess it’s understandable – our beloved PM is just about the only buddy he’s got left.

But the upshot of the earlier visit is that all the security plans have been thrown into turmoil and, according to some reports, costing us taxpayers millions of dollars in extra security. Thanks to the earlier visit, we’ll all have to put up with pretty much a whole week of massive interruptions, just to accommodate a world leader that most of us – and also most of America, by now – wish had never taken office.

When he arrives, we’re all going to get that annoyed feeling you get when an unwelcome relative comes to stay, and everyone has to shift bedrooms. Only this particular annoying relative is so important that anywhere he needs to go, there’s a massive motorcade, and hundreds of Secret Service agents and even snipers on the surrounding rooftops. Honestly, President Bush’s visit would be a massive hassle and inconvenience even if we liked the guy.

Is all of this security really necessary? Honestly, can’t the guy take his chances? It’s not like they’d be assassinating the real President – as always, Dick Cheney will be secure in his undisclosed location.

Bush is making his social visit a few days early because he has to return to the White House before the end of APEC in order to prepare for the progress report in Iraq. Well, how about I save us Sydneysiders a whole lot of hassle, and give the President his report a few weeks early? Iraq is a debacle. You were wrong. There. Now, Mr President, would you mind leaving us in peace for those extra few days? I’m sure that you and John have a lot to commiserate about – poor approval ratings, electoral disasters and tainted legacies for starters – but can’t he come and stay at your ranch after he loses office or something?

I know the President won’t be inconveniencing us quite as much as he has the residents of Baghdad, for instance, but they are going to fill our city with cement barriers, creating a Green Zone around the Opera House and the rest of the “APEC Precinct”. (Let’s hope this one is better at keeping out bombs than the Baghdad version.) Military personnel will be everywhere, and the police will be allowed to search anyone. You can expect they’ll give those wonderful new arbitrary arrest powers a really thorough workout as well. By the end of the weekend, there will in all likelihood be dozens of new Dr Haneefs to be locked up all over the city.

Quite apart from all the delays and other inconveniences, the security presence sounds like it’s going to make it genuinely scary to travel around the city during APEC. I think I’m going to spend the long weekend in a more tranquil, relaxed city. Beirut, perhaps?

A column about surviving disasters

Residents and workers of the City of Sydney, Clover Moore has spoken, so it’s time to prepare your Go Bags! Have a backpack ready at all times, with water, sneakers, spare keys, a radio, toilet paper, and, most bizarrely, a notepad and pen in case you want to do a quick sketch of the disaster as it unfolds.

Do it today, so that when we’re living in a horrifying, post-Apocalyptic world, you won’t be able to say that we at The Glebe didn’t warn you.

Apologies to those readers who don’t spend part of their day in the Sydney CBD, but unfortunately you don’t live in the main terrorist target area, so you miss out on all the excitement. But also the possibility of death. So, not a bad trade-off, really.

I don’t mean to heap too much scorn on the City of Sydney’s “Let’s Get Ready, Sydney” campaign (check out the relaxing bright orange website at www.cityofsydney.nsw.gov.au/getreadysydney), even though it sounds more like an attempt to get the people of this fair city out on the dancefloor than ready for a large-scale disaster. Move it, Sydney, get busy! Wave your hands in the air! No, like you’re dancing, not like you’re panicking.

But really, it’s sensible advice to be ready for a terror attack. After all, our partners in the Coalition of the Willing have endured them (but don’t worry, John Howard, we know you don’t think Iraq made us more of a terrorist target), and when it happens here, the Go Bags will probably be fairly helpful. They’ll certainly be of more use than a fridge magnet.

Speaking of which, even though the Federal Government helped to fund the campaign, I disagree with those who’ve called it another cynical piece of Liberal scaremongering, designed to sow fear ahead of this year’s election – and not just because the Coalition has little credibility left on these issues. The fact is that even a Tampa-sized information sheet couldn’t unseat Labor’s Tanya Plibersek in the safe seat of Sydney.

Sorry, I’ll just wait while you go and pack yourself a Go Bag, it mustn’t wait a moment longer. I know you want to finish the rest of the column, but don’t worry – it’ll be a reward once you’ve placed some cash and credit cards into the bag, as the Council advises. Yes, right where a burglar can easily find them.

Welcome back. But I hope you haven’t put the bag away yet, because there are few extra things you’ll want to add. I think that if I was gazing on the rubble-filled ruins of my beloved city, a hip flask would come in handy. Prophylactics would also be useful – I remember reading that in the aftermath of 9/11, casual “disaster sex” was rife as people wrestled with their own mortality, and it’s best to be prepared. If you survive a terrorist attack, the last thing you need to do is fall victim to some disease instead.

The Green Deputy Lord Mayor Chris Harris responded to Moore’s brochure with some flippant suggestions, including a copy of the Good Food Guide. But that’s actually a good idea. We Sydneysiders are serious about our food, and if I was starving after hiding underground for days while the radiation dissipated, the last thing I’d want to do when I emerged is eat at a restaurant with only one hat.

In case that the attack is severe, you should pack some back issues of The Glebe, so that previous instalments of this column can form the primary text upon which a new civilization is built. Feel free to erect monuments in my honour to provide hope to the shattered survivors. And when you painstakingly carve statues of me with a pocket knife (oh yeah, pack one of those as well), please bear in mind that I’m much more handsome than the caricature.

Thanks to the City of Sydney’s helpful information, I will sleep a little safer using my Go Bag as a pillow. Thanks, Clover. And you know, I’d have taken her advice even more seriously if, at the time of launching the campaign, she’d actually bothered to make one for herself.

A column about Howard v Costello

Ford v Holden. NSW v Queensland. Big Brother v the Liberal Party. Howard v Costello has taken its place among them as one of the defining conflicts of our time. The only difference is that while Queensland, Holden and the family values lobby have substantial support, Peter Costello’s is a lonely crusade. Neither the public or the rest of his party want to see him dump John Howard from the top job. When he tries to “do the numbers” on a leadership challenge, I can’t imagine our longest-serving Treasurer ever gets to count much higher than one. Which is why he’s slunk back to his office, licking his wounds, instead of mounting any kind of leadership challenge. Still, given Kim Beazley’s insipid performance, at least someone’s serving as John Howard’s Opposition.

It was a desperate effort this week. Arguing that he should have been given the job because of a chat they had in 1994 – which Howard prefaced by saying “I can’t guarantee you anything” – is about as weak as it gets. It’s the equivalent of stamping your feet like a toddler demanding an ice-cream and insisting “But I want it, I want it.” All he accomplished was undermine the party, and with it, his own claims.

Besides, if the deal had been honoured and Howard had left after two terms, that would have meant abandoning the Lodge immediately after the 9/11 attacks. Even Costello probably wouldn’t have wanted to be thrown into the deep end when Australia was plunged into the war on terror. Howard never came closer than matching George Bush’s far-fetched description of him as the “Man of Steel” than he did at that moment. Since then, though, he has come to resemble Superman in several respects – he has certainly proven invulnerable, and he’s consistently fought for the American way, if not for truth and justice. His Deputy could use some Kryptonite about now.

It was ironic to see someone who’s worked alongside him for a decade expressing so much disappointment that John Howard broke a promise. He’s the man who invented the distinction between ‘core’ and ‘non-core’ promises – the latter being the things you said you’d do, but later reveal you hadn’t meant. Would a politician ever make a more non-core promise than one involving handing over power? And as for accusing him of fibbing about the meeting, let’s just remember that his nickname “Honest John” was originally bestowed on him ironically by Paul Keating.

Besides, Costello himself repeatedly denied that there was any deal. So his scomment that his parents had told him always to tell the truth sounds a little hollow.

The whole affair has been wonderfully entertaining, adding some interest to what’s become an extremely dull political landscape. The Coalition has been virtually indestructible for a decade, even through such disasters as the AWB scandal (and Alexander Downer being Foreign Minister in general) and the waterfront dispute, so all lovers of politics have gained enormous interest from watching the cracks beginning to appear. There hasn’t been as interesting a political story since Mark Latham self-destructed.

Costello is stranded in no-man’s land. He has to stay Treasurer, because he’s not popular enough to win from the backbench like Keating. So unless he can somehow convince the electorate that Howard’s past it and that there’s a pressing need for a changeover, he depends entirely on Howard’s whim – and his recent strategy of rattling about a boring issue like federalism isn’t going to win him any votes.

The harsh realisation that voters preferred John Howard left Paul Keating absolutely gutted, and it must be equally painful for Costello to have to deal with being consistently passed over for the PM. But that’s the political reality. So he may as well stop whinging, and join the rest of us in waiting for the day when George Bush’s deputy sheriff hangs up his cowboy boots.

A column about Live Earth

I still remember the global excitement over Live Aid when I was a child. It seemed like the entire world really was singing ‘We Are The World’, as for the first time, the reality of poverty and starvation in Africa hit home. Okay, so I was eight years old on 13 July 1985, and nothing is ever exciting nowadays as it was when I was a kid. Honestly, when I discover a new flavour of Paddle Pops or Kit Kats nowadays, I almost don’t even bother to buy them.

But we can see that large-scale charity concerts are subject to the law of diminishing returns even in ratings terms. Since that first massive, global concert that drew 1.5 billion viewers, there have been many other attempts to bring the planet together through the power of rock. Each one seems to be huger in scale than the last, but has less of an impact. Live 8 wasn’t a patch on Live Aid, and Al Gore’s enormous Live Earth event, with its astonishing eleven venues, has been a bit of a damp squib.

In ratings terms, Live Earth hardly set the planet on fire. In the UK, it got less than half the ratings of the Concert For Diana a week earlier. In the US, it was the worst rating show in its timeslot, garnering a mere 2.7 million primetime viewers. And in Australia, it was screened only on Foxtel. The event reached nothing like the “billions” Al Gore promised in his intro. Then again, he’s got a reputation for exaggerating.

It wasn’t a particularly well-conceived event, either. The Australian leg was rife with complaints of the logistics, not to mention the considerable irony in using enormous quantities of electricity to draw awareness to global warming. There have been controversies over some artists’ links with polluting companies, as well – Madonna in particular.

But most problematically, it’s difficult to argue that the event increased awareness of an issue that is already saturating the media. While Gore has obviously done remarkable things to put climate change in the spotlight, Live Earth does not rank as chief among them. If anything, the parade of celebrities serving up tokenistic slogans threatens to undermine the seriousness of the issue, making it seem like a fad for leftie do-gooders rather than a genuine crisis.

Which is why the genuine debate over the ABC’s climate change documentary should be so welcome, and its ratings of 1.1 million are very encouraging. The national broadcaster (for whom I also work, by way of a disclaimer) has been excoriated for screening Martin Durkin’s The Great Global Warming Swindle, and it’s entirely possible that there was improper political pressure for it to do so – we’ll probably never know.

But the way it ultimately chose to present the film, with a follow-up cross-examination of Durkin by Tony Jones and then a discussion by a panel of experts, showed the commitment to genuine debate that makes the ABC such a valuable institution. And if the outcome was inconclusive, and Durkin’s perspective not 100% discredited, then so much the better – Al Gore’s is not the only justifiable position in the debate. Far better for us to devote time to examining the science carefully than to listening to another irritating procession of millionaire rockstars lecturing us on how to spend our lives. Even though Durkin is probably wrong, it’s better to examine his arguments carefully than dismiss because we don’t like his politics.

However, enough scientists agree with Gore’s general thrust (if not every detail) to mandate action. And even if Durkin were right, it’s still sensible to control energy use and CO2 emissions on general principle. We can’t know in advance what the impact of so radically changing the atmosphere will be, so it’s wise for us to leave the lightest footfall possible on the planet. And the most common method of “offsetting” CO2, planting trees, is a worthwhile endeavour whether or not you believe every slide in An Inconvenient Truth.

I’d much rather the Gores of this world exaggerated the scale of the problem and spurred people into inherently worthwhile actions than have the Durkins encouraging people to sit with their heads in the sand. Or underwater, more likely, if the worst-case sea level projections are correct. And please, next time we need to convince the planet of something, let’s do it without the charity concerts. Sting gets put in front of more than enough microphones as it is.

A column about chain stores

In 1998, the Broadway Shopping Centre transformed an abandoned building into the retail mecca we know and love – or, more accurately, patronise because of a lack of alternatives – today. Local retailers were terrified that this retail Godzilla would trample on the village charm of Glebe Point Rd either by sending them broke, or destroying the atmosphere by encouraging chain stores to take over the main strip. Badde Manors, it was feared, might make way for Big Macs.

The new “category killer” stores like Kmart, Freedom and Harvey Norman, with large ranges at low prices, posed a huge challenge to local retailers. The Collins Booksellers megastore seemed particularly threatening to Glebe’s uniquely esoteric assortment of bookshops, and locals were especially worried for Gleebooks. To stay in business, even a shop that regularly wins Australian Bookstore of the Year has to peddle large quantities of The Da Vinci Code.

Collins was a 1231 square-metre bookselling behemoth, whose bizarre redundant entrance hall alone could have swallowed most of Gleebooks’ floorspace. Plus it had a café, and an ABC shop to augment its enormous range. Sure, Collins didn’t have quite the same volume of material dealing with the finer nuances of the Hegelian dialectical approach, but that just seemed all the more reason why Gleebooks would be the one to go.

In April, though, Collins was declared bankrupt. Score one to David – although the victory probably belongs just as much to Borders, a bigger Goliath that out-megastored the megastore. A new Dymocks has recently opened in Collins’ place, and with more experience in the Sydney market, they’ll probably do better. Besides, they must have gotten a great deal on the rent.

Even up against Dymocks, though, Gleebooks should continue as strongly as ever thanks to one of the Inner West’s most endearing characteristics. Stores in Balmain, Leichhardt, Glebe and Newtown are generally one-off neighbourhood-style operations because the locals hate chain stores like they hate a badly-made latte.

In particular, they hate the globally ubiquitous Starbucks, where those two things so often go together. The only outlet in the area is in Balmain, and that opened to many protests. As for the rest of the area, I guess their market research found that places that are famous for offering the actual café experience would not welcome a pale imitation, and especially one that insists on charging a premium for its caffeinated dishwater.

When other chain stores have tried to expand here, they’ve learned that local residents often vote with their wallets. Closures of McDonalds’ outlets are as rare as healthy products on their menu were before Super Size Me, but the one in King St Newtown shut many years ago. The students of Sydney Uni also succeeded in fending off a Burger King a few years ago – at their new sport and recreation centre, cheekily enough.

But the chain-store failure that gave me most satisfaction was Glebe Point Rd’s first American fast food outlet, Baskin-Robbins. It just seemed so very wrong when they opened opposite Well Connected a few years ago, but they lasted all of a few months before their hideously bright pink neon lights were turned off for good. It’s a discerning area that can’t sustain a Baskin-Robbins but seems to have an unlimited appetite for North Indian Diners.

There have been a lot of changes in Glebe since Broadway opened, and some businesses have found things tougher. But for the most part, the two very different shopping areas have had a surprisingly comfortable co-existence. It’s been heartening to see in an era of retail consolidation, when the same boring brands are increasingly seen all over the country. And as much as some local residents still worry about the way things are changing, nearly everyone’s benefited from the convenience of Broadway. It’s given us a great place to park when we visit Glebe Point Rd.

A column about Prince William

The doubts over Prince Harry’s paternity have persisted, given that flame-red shock of hair that’s embarrassingly reminiscent of James Hewitt’s, but Prince William sure seems to be a chip off the old block. And I’m not just referring to his simpering chin and unfortunately premature baldness. According to recent news reports, he’s tried to repeat his father’s attempts to become Governor-General, which were so sensibly rebuffed by the Hawke Government in the 1980s. Which shows, if nothing else, that Prince Phillip’s aristocratic gaffe genes are expressing themselves in the third generation.

Sure, I can see the appeal from the princes’ perspective. If I had to grow up with the hounding of the British press, the restrictions imposed by a control freak queen and her out-of-touch consort, and worst of all, that weather, I’d have loved to head south to do a cushy stint in Yarralumla as well. In fact, if I were made king – and my lineage is English, so I’m probably legitimately 32,654,823nd in line to the throne – I’d permanently relocate Buckingham Palace to Australia. Not only would it kill the most potent republican argument, but my British subjects’ enthusiasm would remain undiminished – they’d follow my mundane Antipodean exploits just as avidly as they devour Neighbours and Home & Away.

But what an utterly misguided request to make. Charles was apparently offended by being turned down. One had offered to help, and one had had one’s offer thrown back in one’s face by that uncouth Australian prime minister. How wonderfully monarchical of him merely to assume that anyone would be happy to have a snotty-nosed toff turning up to open our flower shows. Well okay, so we generally get that anyway, given the kind of people who’re tapped for Governor-General – Peter Hollingworth, certainly. But a snotty-nosed English toff, though, would be too much to bear.

Wills, however, can almost be forgiven for reviving the idea, because our nation cast a vote eight years ago that emphatically endorsed governance by snotty-nosed English toffs. Why shouldn’t one come and do the job directly, instead of appointing a local subordinate to do it? From one perspective, it’s an admirable piece of personal service by an institution that doesn’t usually bother to leave its extensive collection of palaces for more than a few days at a time.

And thus we have the strange contradiction that emerges when John Howard steps forward to gently decline Wills’ offer. "Although I remain a supporter of our current constitutional arrangements, I do think the practice of having a person who is an Australian in every way and a long-term and permanent resident of this country is a practice I would not like to see altered," he said. We like one of our own filling in for the gig, and shudder when the Crown itself offers to fulfil its constitutional role because it seems grossly inappropriate. But then we wouldn’t dream of giving an Aussie the role permanently. It really is a twisted piece of reasoning.

When John Howard has finally left the stage, there will doubtlessly be another referendum. All of his likely Liberal replacements are Republicans, and that will give us a bipartisan consensus that should enable us to avoid having our referendum hijacked by scaremongering over the model. The sheer inappropriateness of Prince William becoming Governor-General, though, should give all monarchists serious pause for thought. If we won’t let him do his job in person, because we want someone who has contributed to our society in the gig, what are we so afraid of when it comes to making the existing de facto arrangement permanent?

A column about euthanasia

You can't keep Dr Phillip Nitschke down, can you? Somewhat ironically for a euthanasia advocate, he never seems to give up. Every few months he bounces back in the headlines with a new angle on assisted suicide. He was heavily involved in the NT’s brief period of legal euthanasia, he’s constructed made a “suicide machine” And recently, a court banned his book on “peaceful pills” – a macabre euphemism if ever I’ve heard one – which contained easy household recipes for topping yourself in the comfort of your own kitchen. Mmm, now that’s peaceful.

It was banned not because of the euthanasia aspect, but because of fears that those helpful everyday recipes would have made it easier to commit murder. Which I think does a great disservice to the creativity of our nation’s murdering community. How hard is it to dream up the idea of mixing bleach and Drano?

(Note that the previously supplied recipe has not been tested and may not result in death. If it does, though, neither this newspaper or I will be liable for any “peace” that may result.)

But Nitschke’s latest effort has reached a new level of controversy, and poses an interesting moral conundrum. He's been arguing that Martin Bryant, who killed 35 people at Port Arthur, should be given a chance to kill himself in prison. Nitschke says the state is not interested in rehabilitating him, and that it’s cruel to essentially leave him to rot in jail. I don’t imagine that even the most passionate prison reform advocate would try and argue that Bryant should be prepared for a release into the community, so perhaps Nitschke has a point? Perhaps it would be better for everyone if Bryant were given – not the death penalty, but the death option?

He might well take it. Bryant has tried to kill himself five times, though it’s unclear how serious the efforts were. On one occasion, he swallowed a tube of toothpaste – which may not be a suicide attempt at all, but merely a case of reading the instructions very, very badly. Each time, he has been foiled.

I’ve been thinking about Martin Bryant since the Virginia Tech killing earlier in the year. I was astonished that no massacres on the Port Arthur scale had ever happened in the USA, and ended up re-reading an account of that horrific day. Even all these years later, the sheer brutality of Bryant is utterly shocking. It’s hard to avoid the conclusion that it might have been better for everyone if Bryant’s last victim had been himself, as was the case in Virginia. And I imagine it could be making it that much harder for the victims’ families to know that he is still alive.

There were calls for his execution at the time of his trial. But like most Australians, I have always believed that the death penalty is inhumane, and should simply not be on the table, even in the most extreme of cases. I didn’t support it for Saddam Hussein, and I don’t support it for Martin Bryant either. And Nitschke’s argument that society should give him the option to kill himself is somehow humane seems perverse. I can understand the argument that terminally ill people in enormous pain should be allowed to end it, but Bryant’s pain is existential. It’s the inevitable result of his own actions, and if he spends the next fifty years stuck in jail reflecting on it, and perhaps even one day regretting it, then so much the better.

Suicide has been an all-too-common theme in Australian prisons. And in the light of our problem with black deaths in custody, the need to stand firm against all varieties of prison death is all the greater. Prison demonstrably causes mental illness, and anyone choosing suicide in prison cannot be assumed to be truly free in their choice.

The decision to keep Bryant alive shows that we as a nation value life in all circumstances. It makes a powerful and worthwhile statement about our values, and our humanity. Because the humane approach is one that always values life. Yes, even one as sordid and destructive as Martin Bryant’s.

A column about Facebook

I’ve had terrible trouble finishing this week’s column. Usually my wisdom flows rapidly onto the page, and before I know it, I’m patting myself on the back after another yet successful instalment in my life’s mission to make the world a better place. Mahatma Gandhi chose passive resistance, the Dalai Lama chose travelling the world and teaching people, while my chosen medium is brief, pisstakey newspaper columns. Each guru has their own methods.

But this week, the distractions have been constant. I’m in the middle of crafting some pithy epithet about global warming, when my phone buzzes. Then, after I’ve dealt with that, and am midway through composing a powerful statement on industrial relations that will shake the very government to its core, someone sends me a message on Google Chat enquiring “what r u doing tonight,? ;)” I pause to enlighten them – because I give knowledge to all who ask, friends, not just the readers of The Glebe – and before I know it, my train of thought has been derailed completely.

Ever since email and SMSing took off, the constant textual harassment has grown to a maddening din. And, unusually for a guru, I haven’t a shred of self-discipline, so I eagerly seize up every single distraction. Honestly, it’s amazing that I can I accomplish anything at all, let alone produce words that touch as many people as mine do.

Things have gotten completely out of hand in the past month, though. Sadly, I have now become completely consumed by pointless internet messaging. And this addiction that is destroying what little productivity I have left has a name. And it is Facebook.

I’ve written about MySpace before in these pages, the social networking site owned by the publishers of this newspaper, News Corporation. I’ve used that for a few years, and it’s been fun. (Don’t worry, Rupert hasn’t asked me personally to talk it up. He respects my integrity too much for that.) But the problem with MySpace is that sadly, I’m too old. Sure, I had a few younger buddies I used to chat to, but my oldest and dearest friends would never have indulged in so teenybopperish an obsession. I am ageless, of course, but my friends are in their late twenties and early thirties. And it is they who have embraced Facebook.

What is it? Well, you have a list of friends, and you send messages and invite each other to social events. Yes, I’m aware it sounds lame, for those who haven’t been sucked into its evil web. The problem is that, probably because its owners have concluding some compact with Satan himself, everyone I know has just joined it.

Every day, my list of online friends swells by a couple more. And they span the whole gamut of my life – people I knew from school, people I knew from uni and people I talked to for five minutes at a party the other night. They’re all in touch with me, perhaps forever.

Sorry, let me pause for a moment here. Something important has come up. I’ve just been invited to be Facebook friends with someone who used to date someone who I haven’t seen in the past six years. Okay, click. New friend acquired. Awesome.

What I’m going to do with all of these new old friends, I don’t know. Maybe I’ll hold a massive reunion. Maybe I’ll foment revolution. Maybe both at once. But it’s nice to feel in touch with so many people I’ve once known, even so superficially.

And while the constant deluge of pointless invitations to join pointless groups (I just joined “Chuck Norris could punch someone in their soul”, which promises an interesting blend of metaphysics and crappy 80s action films) can become a little annoying, I sincerely hope everyone I know ultimately joins FaceBook. Oh, and MySpace, of course, Rupert.

I may never see half of these people in the flesh ever again, but as I sit here by myself typing, I feel like I’m not alone in the universe. And in some way, that’s meaningful.

So take that, Dalai Lama. I have a message of holistic interconnectedness to spread to the universe as well. I’m not sure if you’re on Facebook, your Holiness, but if you are, let’s be friends.

A column about spin

The opinion polls show that Kevin Rudd’s honeymoon with voters is stretching on into the distance far further than your average newlyweds have any right to expect. The man’s popularity seems to be as impermeable as his hair. Peter Costello just put up a humdinger of a budget, which remarkably delivered both tax cuts and massive spending increases targeted at Labor’s pet policy areas like education and child care, and it made virtually no difference to the poll numbers. Despite being almost universally applauded by the pundits – heck, Costello even slung money at the film industry, of all people – the man from Queensland still has a lock on the Lodge.

But while I’m now eagerly anticipating the election – especially compared to the total flatliner that was that last NSW poll – my hopes of a bright new future under Cap’n Kevvy are quickly waning. The sense that we might finally have a leader who wasn’t afraid to throw a bit of vision into the political mix was an exciting thing. Well, at least relative to Beazley, Crean and Howard. And Rudd’s talk of education as the source of competitive advantage for our nation rather than the begrudging, ever-dwindling afterthought it’s been under the Coalition really made sense.

Folks, I fear we’ve got a federal version of Bob Carr on our hands. A hyper-intelligent man with strong values, who instead of figuring out how to achieve the most good, is hell-bent on figuring out how to achieve the most votes. A politician who uses his unusual gifts not to transform society, but to hang onto power. In his decade in charge, Carr displayed a mastery of the media unseen in Australian politics – and certainly lost on the hapless Morris Iemma. It’s no coincidence that Carr’s media svengali, Walt Seccord, is now working for Rudd.

It’s happening time and time again. Instead of doing the right thing, instead of keeping with principles he’s previously backed, Rudd hedges his bets with his eyes firmly on the polls. His changes to industrial relations, which the unions have only begrudgingly accepted because of Rudd’s popularity and their total lack of alternatives, have traded away more rights than any Labor leader ever. And his treatment of the Dalai Lama issue, where he looked like a hypocrite for refusing to meet His Holiness and then had to reverse his stance after the PM caught him out, was far removed from the principled stance he took at the time of the Tibetan leader’s last visit. Whereas it seemed at first that we had a philosopher-king of sorts, who would transport us to a brighter future through the sheer compellingness of his ideas, it now seems we have the most populist Labor politician since Bob Hawke. Or, in many respects, a Labor John Howard.

It’s probably not surprising that the man is being so cautious after eleven years of Opposition, and after he’s sat watching successive Labor leaders implode for being either too bold or not bold enough. As the left had to concede at the party’s conference, while it’s working, there’s reason to believe that the man can do no wrong. Many in the party have taken the position that he can say whatever he likes as long as he wins, and that the time to judge him will be once he’s in office.

But just because you don’t put a foot wrong doesn’t mean you necessarily go the extra mile to do what’s right, and that’s where we will see if Kevin Rudd really does live up to the hype. If his leadership is like that of Bob Carr or Tony Blair, and outstanding only in his ability to manipulate the media, the nation will be left with an equally bad taste in its mouth. And a crucial opportunity to remake Australia as a globally competitive knowledge economy will have been wasted forever.

A column about fashion week

Fashion Week comes but twice a year, and every time the stories are the same. There are the usual gushing articles about glamorous shows written by journalists who apparently interact wit the world largely through the medium of air-kissing. There are the publicity stunts, like Tsubi or Ksubi or %#@ubi or whatever fool thing they’re called these days covering their models in blood and releasing rats everywhere. A little inappropriate, I’d have thought, since rats are famous for eating everything.

Then there’s the hype over the supermodels who’ve flown in in what’s generally described as a “coup”. Unfortunately they’re generally not ‘super’ enough for me to have actually heard of them. Sure, Kate Moss, Cindy Crawford, even Gemma Ward I’ve heard of, but forgive me for not getting excited about the arrival of Erin Wasson. Apparently she’s pretty or something.

The world of fashion is largely a mystery to me. I’ve got a vague handle on the kind of clothes that Versace and Armani produce, but I’m almost completely ignorant about current Australian designers. I know that people talk about Akira Isogawa a lot, but I couldn’t for the life of me tell you what kind of clothes he designs. And even religious viewing of the current series of Australia’s Next Top Model has left me ignorant, I’m afraid to say. Although I do now know who Alex Perry is, and also that he should definitely shave off his little goatee.

But I have been following the biggest story from last week’s Spring/Summer Fashion extravaganza (why you would show them in autumn remains a mystery to me), and that has, as ever, been concern about models who are unhealthily skinny.

In particular, I’ve been following because the controversy has centred around one of the contestants from Top Model, Alice Burdeu. That’s because she is, apparently, a size zero model. And you’d have to agree, that doesn’t sound healthy at all. She’s a measly 58kg on a frame of 185cm, but what if she went on a diet? Okay, an even more severe diet? Would she be a minus-two?

She’ll probably win, because she looks luminous when photographed, but she isn’t exactly an awesome role model for young girls. Her self-esteem problems are fairly well documented in the show, and in the straight-to-camera interviews she seems almost impossibly lethargic. She seems so unhealthy that no less a personage than guest judge Ian Thorpe took her to one side and gave her a stern talking-to about her diet. I was impressed that he cared, but I’d have been even more impressed if he cooked her up a quick steak and force-fed it to her, personally. That’s what seems to be required.

It’s not just little (and I do mean little) Alice, though. I’ve seen the photos from the controversial Azzolini show, which featured skeletons marching around in swimwear. And it made me wonder where this whole “thin is in” thing came from. I think it looks terrible. Personally I don’t find the junkie look sexy in the least. Anyone dating a model these days – not that I’ve ever had the dubious privilege – seems likely to severely injure themselves on a protruding rib.

I know it’s a cliché to say so, but you have to wonder what these images do to young girls.

Because of all the hype, and because of the popularity of shows like Top Model, our fashion industry has a responsibility. And it’s time it did more to discharge it.

Some fashion weeks have instituted a minimum body-mass index for their models, but the Australian version has pooh-poohed this, saying it’ll self-regulate. Well, I’m sorry, but sometimes people with eating disorders – and I think this accurately describes our entire fashion industry at this point, looking at some of the footage from last week – have to be force-fed. They lose the right to make their own decisions about what’s healthy. Well, it’s time we forced Fashion Week onto an intravenous drip.

A column about cycling

As the scholars who study all of my Glebe columns in the nation’s most prestigious universities will know, recent instalments have focussed on my attempts to get into shape. A kind of print-based Biggest Loser, if you will. Well, the combination of Nintendo Wii and personal trainer has done wonders for me, make no mistake. But I want more. Much more. I will not rest until my body is bulging with massive musculature.

I want to be one of those guys that kicks sand in the faces of puny wimps at the beach, in fitness ads from the 1950s. I want Chesty Bonds to have to design a new range to accommodate my pectorals, as opposed to my gut. And so I have continued my relentless (okay, largely relenting, in actual fact) fitness campaign by purchasing a bicycle.

This might be something that’s later quoted, tragically, at a state funeral held in my honour (hey, Kerry Packer got one, and I’ve done more for the country than him, surely?) after an eighteen-wheeler crushes me and my trusty Trek into the Parramatta Rd asphalt. But the bike’s the best thing I’ve ever bought. It gets you around really quickly – for the kind of inner-city trips I generally do, it beats a car hands down in terms of speed. And it’s incredibly fun to ride – an essential component in any fitness plan I’m likely to stick to. I feel like a kid, zipping around the roads and doing jumps off kerbs. Well, only little jumps. Turns out I’m as much of a wuss at thirty as I was when I was eight.

Best of all, it seems to be getting me fit. I regularly finish a ride attractively drenched with sweat, and my muscles turn to jelly after I’m out on the bike, so it must be doing some kind of good. And whereas running up a virtual hill at the gym has always seemed kind of pointless, wanting to quickly end the agony of riding up an actual hill is a great incentive to push yourself further.

But there is a serious downside to riding a bike. It’s extremely scary, especially when you’re a new cyclist, and have difficulty controlling your wobbling, like me. (Although to be fair, I have problems with wobbling when I walk as well.) I know that Sydney City Council has put a lot of time into bike lanes in recent years, and I applaud that, but it’s just hideously dangerous to have cars coming up behind you, and overtaking. As a cyclist, there’s nothing you can do to guarantee your own safety – you’re just relying on cars to avoid you. And then there are the lungfuls of fumes. Shared roads are better than roads with no bike lane at all, but they’re not a great solution

So, radically changing my political opinions to suit my own convenience, I have instantly become a passionate advocate of cycleways. Bikes really are the perfect inner-city transportation system, and they combat obesity, one of our biggest health problems. Our cities are too choked with cars already. So why not get tough on cars, and shut down a few roads – or make proper, car-width cycle lanes? If we make riding bikes more convenient than driving cars for short, inner-city trips, more people will make the shift. Just think of the difference in terms of pollution and noise.

Alternatively, the easiest solution is that adopted in Japan – allow people to ride on the pavement, as long as they do so slowly. As long as you have a bell, it’s fairly safe. And it will help pedestrians get fit as well, as they leap out of the way.

Of course, none of this mattered to me before I got a bike. As a motorist, I used to find avoiding cyclists annoying. Now I know that they are precious jewels, and need to be cared for as lovingly as any baby. So I will use my enormous influence to agitate for more cycleways, and I urge you, faithful readers, to saddle up and brave the streets to put more pressure on our councils to take bold steps. Hell, if we can close roads willy-nilly for a disastrous cross-city tunnel, surely we can shut a few for bikes.

A column about Earth Hour

So, what did you during Earth Hour? Some friends of mine had a candlelit party down at Glebe Point, looking out across the water as the lights went out. Well, a few of the lights went out, as it turned out. Very romantic it was too, by all accounts.

I’ve no doubt that the rest of the Greens-voting Glebe readership that gave Labor so palpable a scare in Balmain and Marrickville the other weekend did its bit, and want to congratulate you for it. I raise a metaphorical glass of chai to you all.

I’m not so sure about the environmental benefits, which, as many have pointed out, were probably cancelled out by everyone who drove across town to admire the effect from a convenient harbourside viewpoint. The Australian said that the whole project saved enough electricity to be the equivalent in CO2 terms of taking seven cars off the road for a year. Which is not bad for an hour, I suppose. But gee – after all the hype, double figures would’ve been nice.

Me? Well, I helped consume a whopping amount of electricity, so it’s not really fair for me to cast aspersions on the efforts of other, now, is it? I was at the V Festival in Centennial Park, where the token concession to the effort was that Beck turned the lights out onstage for one whole song. Then again, his flu-afflicted performance was so low-energy that he must have saved megawatts all by himself.

So I did nothing. But I’d ask you to understand that my desire to help the environment, especially in a non-lifechanging way, was strong. Unfortunately my desire to see The Pixies was that little bit stronger. But seriously, anytime you need someone to flick a switch to save the planet on a night when one of history’s finest indie bands isn’t making a rare appearance, I’m there.

Oh, and the Festival put the Earth Hour logo up on the big screens a lot, presumably to remind us what we weren’t contributing to. I found it a touch ironic that they decided to use electric lights to screen the logo of a project dedicated to reducing the use of electricity.

The event wasn’t actually about saving energy, though, of course. It was about raising awareness. And it certainly did that. Fabulously influential columnists such as myself are discussing it not only in Australia, but across the world. As a PR initiative, Earth Hour was excellent.

Because it raises some very worthwhile questions. Like, why do city office blocks need their lights on all weekend anyway? And why can’t they just fit timer switches, like old-school apartment blocks, so that those who are beavering away on the weekend can turn on the light just in their areas? Closer to home, my apartment building lights its communal areas 24/7, and there really isn’t a need. There are heaps of examples, when you stop and think about it. Usually, we don’t. But for an hour there, we did.

Well, it was more like two minutes for me, in fact. Most of my mind was busy hoping Beck’s voice would improve, and that he’d do some of his non hip-hop material. But the important thing is that I did think about it, for the first time since I saw An Inconvenient Truth, was shocked and appalled and then didn’t bother to actually do anything.

You know, we snooty Westerners like to criticise the North Koreans for being backward. Many pundits have joked that if you look at night satellite photos of Pyongyang (which I recommend Googling, they’re hilarious) it looks deserted. But that’s not true. They’ve just been celebrating tEarth Decade. We’d do well, in fact, to be more like them. Well, perhaps without the brutal totalitarian rule or the famine.

But we need to consciously reduce our energy consumption more frequently than an hour a year. And if we do – and only if we do – then Earth Hour will have meant something more than an interesting visual effect to enjoy while sipping wine at a picturesque harbourside location.

A column about the US primaries

What a difference an election makes. After 11 long years in the wilderness, at least federally, Labor rules the roost. Sure, the Iemma Government is at best hilariously incompetent and at worst hideously corrupt, but Kevin Rudd is clearly going to be our Prime Minister for a very long time. I don’t think his current levels of popularity would take much of a hit even if it was revealed we was having a torrid affair with Brian Burke, given his current opponent. In fact, the only surprising thing about Brendan Nelson’s 7% approval rating is that it isn’t lower.

Domestic politics is boring again. Which is probably why there’s more interest in the US primaries than ever before. And in this era of cable and the internet when we can access America’s saturation coverage almost as easily as the locals can it’s all too easy to get hooked. It’s kind of like the Ultimate Fighting Championship, only if the brutal cage fights in the Octagon lasted for two years.

So it’s no wonder our dinner party conversations are increasingly dominated by fervent discussions of the merits of Barack Obama versus Hillary Clinton. It’s a fascinating contest that still shows no sign of being resolved, as Clinton has somehow climbed off the mat in Ohio and Texas. The Democrat primary is in some respects an embarrassment of riches, given two such different and meritorious candidates, who will each make history if elected. Would you rather the first black candidate or the first woman? Will the patriarchy win, or will white power carry the day? Like the choice between smashing a Celine Dion CD with a sledgehammer or running it over with a steamroller, there are qualitative differences, but it’s ultimately a win-win.

I know that statement will attract howls of indignance from the Barack fans, because Obamamania been set in here as well. Inner-city trendies are announcing the death of “politics as usual” and chanting “yes we can” over their lattes in Glebe, Newtown and Balmain, just as they are in Greenwich Village or Berkeley. And sure, Obama is a remarkable speaker. Whereas hearing Bush struggle with the English language is even more depressing than an episode of So You Think We Can Dance, listening to Obama speak is like being hugged. And I instinctively agree with much of what he has to say about issues like Iraq, and health care, and the malaise within the American political system. But there is one huge problem with his campaign as far as I’m concerned, and that is that I’m a cynic. Obama may be the first genuinely inspirational politician ever, and capable of performing hitherto unseen magic tricks to transform Washington if elected, but I’m still far from convinced. The guy’s only been involved in national politics for six years, and he’s spent three of them campaigning for President.

And then there’s Hillary, whom everyone just seems to hate. I can’t entirely fathom this. I don’t exactly like the prospect of the leadership of the free world continuing within the purview of the Bush and Clinton families – but for goodness sake, she seems hugely competent. I know she’s a cynical politician, not a weaver of dreams like Obama, and I know that every time she cries, a committee has approved it beforehand. But I really like the idea of someone who knows what they’re doing. And despite his obvious intelligence and policy nous, there’s just something that leaves me a little unconvinced that Obama necessarily does. In the end of the day, I’d be fairly happy with either. I’d go Obama, on the basis of the Iraq vote alone, but can anyone really deny that Hillary would do a decent job?

The general election will be fascinating as well, because the Republicans have somehow nominated an interesting and worthy candidate in spite of themselves. I thought they’d be attracted to the insincere corporate charms of Mitt Romney, who is the Mormon Malcolm Turnbull, or the folksy preacher, Mike Huckabee. Then again, I’m not sure the world is ready for a candidate whose major celebrity endorsement is from Chuck Norris.

The Democrat race is far from resolved, and the match-up with the generally impressive McCain should be a treat as well. So for once, we politics junkie should be grateful to America. Because when we’re watching yet another lineball debate between Clinton and Obama, we’re not watching Brendan Nelson. And for that we should all be truly grateful.

A column about personal training

I’ve been going to the gym on and off for a while in attempt to resculpt my body into something ever slightly less reminiscent of Jabba the Hutt, but I haven’t really been getting anywhere. The prospect of staying in bed is generally too appealing in the morning, and I spend the rest of my working hours tirelessly answering my usual avalanche of adoring fan mail from readers of The Glebe. Actually, that part of my story isn’t true. And yes, this is a not-terribly-subtle hint.

Anyway, the last time I worked up a light sweat at my local gymnasium, I saw the light. In the form of a poster. It claimed that only 25% of gym users achieve the results they want, and of them, 90% of them use personal trainers.

Interesting. I generally respond well to being bossed around. Perhaps being bullied into shape by some muscular Amazon or Adonis might be the way to finally get myself into shape? Specifically, a less spherical shape.

I signed up, and found myself bowling up to the gym at the ungodly hour of 9am, ready for my date with the New Me. I don’t have much in the way of fitness gear, and am lazy when it comes to washing as well as exercise, so I was sporting extremely tatty trainers, a George Bush t-shirt that somehow never comes across as ironically as I expect it to, and a pair of what were obviously swimming shorts.

Bad idea. My gym is so depressingly full of buff blokes tirelessly pumping iron so they can get another layer of triceps on their biceps (that may not be anatomically correct, but you know what it looks like) that I felt I’d failed before I even began. I made a note to immediately sprint (well, waddle, to be more accurate) down to my nearest Rebel and stock up on swanky workout gear as soon as my session ended.

My trainer was a lovely bloke. Unfortunately, though, the first session was a fitness test, and not one involving any of the regular gym machines. He took me into a little room and weighed and measured me before making me do a bunch of sit-ups, push-ups. And by a bunch, I mean “less than a dozen”. This was to calculate my ‘fitness age’ – the age for which my physical condition would be considered normal. You may have seen the concept in an ad with Steve Waugh that’s going around where he gets the reassuring that he’s in his mid-30s physically.

Well, I’m only 30, but I’m not in great shape. So I thought I may well be up around Steve Waugh’s actual age of 41. I waited with bated breath while the computer worked it all out for me, and spat out a number.

It was 70. That’s right, seventy. Seven zero. In other words, I have the body of a retiree.

The breakdown was even more damning. I have the flexibility of a 50-year-old (ladies!), the strength of a 62-year-old and the body and cardio performance of an 80-year-old. And since the current Australian life expectancy for men is 78, I should by rights be dead.

I tried to look on the bright side. Of course, we’re talking about a fit 70-year-old. You know, a spritely older gentleman who enjoys long walks and perhaps still plays lawn bowls, when his hips are up to it. That’s not so bad, is it?

But as I moped home, my shoulders slumped and my thoughts of shiny new gym gear forgotten, I began to question the point. If my gym wants me to partake of its products and services, how does insulting me help, exactly?

And then I began to think positive. Not only could I now wear cardigans and use a walking stick, but with an official physical age of 70, perhaps I could qualify for the pension?

It certainly has been a wake-up call, though. I have vowed to persist with the gym, and try harder. With a few month of solid work and my trainer’s encouragement, I might even be able to get that pesky number down below retirement age.