rickeyre.com

"People can say a lot of ridiculous things and they should be able to say ridiculous things in a democracy..."

CARIBBEAN: Special Cricket Visa Irks Tourism Industry
- PORT OF SPAIN, Jan 29 (IPS) - It's billed as the third biggest sporting event in the world after the football World Cup and the Olympics.
[Inter Press Service]

Repeat after me:

Miserable failure.

There was great anticipation and excitement in Sydney on Australia Day with the news that Google Inc. had chartered an aeroplane to photograph the city for an update of Google Earth. Many parties, giant signs, marriage proposals etc were arranged for the morning. The plane turned up after everyone had gone home.

The Sydney Morning Herald http://www.smh.com.au/news/biztech/google-botch-

With any luck, he'll be our Prime Minister by the time Australia Day comes around again:

A selection of Youtube images of Australia Day. Makes you long for the good old days of the ocker, eh?

Today, January 26, is Australia Day. But today in Sydney I saw two Australias marking the occasion.

Youtube Du Jour sounds like a famous Senegalese musician, but it is in fact a new featurette section that I am including in this blog from time to time.

One (or maybe more, or maybe less) video of interest to me, noted from Google Inc. subsidiary, Youtube. I have retrospectively launched the series with the Brett Lee/Asha Bhosle music video from India.

This evening, John Winston Howard will announce this year's Australian of the Year, to be chosen from the eight state and territory finalists. This is my third annual preview of the award, see my previous entries in 2005 and 2006.

In an astonishing set of coincidences, political advertisements placed in three Tasmanian newspapers early in 2006 condemning the Greens on behalf of the Exclusive Brethren were recorded as being paid for out of Liberal Party electoral accounts.

Three separate and entirely unrelated "administrative bungles" at the Hobart Mercury, Launceston Advocate and Devonport Examiner caused sales records to give the totally and utterly absurd impression that the Liberal Party was colluding with the Brethren.