Jerry_Atrick

Hmmm.. Would OME want to kiss frogs in the hope of a prince?

GON, my response was not a joke. The ACCC have been given more teeth some time ago, and each state has its own consumer body as well. In Victoria it is (or was) the Small Claims Tribunal, of which I successfully took a case of a used car dealer who sold me a car with a pitted windscreen, It wasn't obvious for a week or so until the sun started shining. He said no way would be fit a new windscreen (by law at the time, the car had to be sold with a Road Worthy Certificate, and although it did have one, it was clearly invalidated by the windscreen). So, I lodged a claim, paid something like $20. This was long before the days of VCAT, which is free for claims up tp $3,000. At the time. there was no legal representation and the facts with evidence were put to the arbitrator.. I won the case and the dealer had to replace the windscreen. But it gets better; the arbitrator knew a thing or two about cars and referred to the then Road Traffic Authority (now Vicroads) and the garage/workshop that issued the RWC lost its license to issue them after an investigation. Now, I will admit, nothing is automatic, but to be fair to both parties, someone independent has to have a chance to have their say as sometimes the evidence by itself can paint different interpretations depending on context and confirmation bias. I understand, when Kennett brought in VCAT, it was weighted on the side of the company, but I have had a family member that also won their case there, too. Re the "Super Medical Troubleshooting" team, shows a little ignorance. Firstly, the case you cite is a very sad one, but relatively rare, thankfully. Yes, we all have tales of how we or someone we love or know has had rotten or negligent treatment. But compare that to the number of patients that come through the system, and yes, no system is 100% complete. Firstly, at public hospitals in Victoria anyway, you can apprach and respectfully challenge staff and then you can lodge complaints. When something like this case happens - or when there is an unexpected death, it is internally reviewed through bursars and the medical board and decisions/actions taken. It can be anything from no fault, to retraining, to dismissal. The AMA get involved as do the states and occasionally federal departments of health. And, as OME points out, they all go to the coroner, as well. It has been reported that staff claim the desire to cut costs to increase profit by a private company has contributed to the death and other service issues at the hospital. That may or may not be the case, but the Minss government has already moved to ban future public/private "partnerships" for hospitals in the future: https://www.9news.com.au/national/joe-massa-nsw-government-announces-joes-law-northern-beaches-hospital-sydney/adb4a93e-ba29-4c9d-9016-c2a0ac5d3d2e I agree the health system and other public serve systems need to be shaken up. There is too much servitude to the process, whatever that process is, without logically taking action to the facts in front of them. I was at the Monash Medical Centre in Springvale (I think) with an ailment that was painful, but under control. Parents walked in with their teenage daughter doubled over in obviously serious pain; they gave her some panadol/nurofen and told her to sit .. this poor girl was in agony and in the end I went up to the reception to complain that this girl should be seen to pretty quickly. They said their process was first come first serve. .I said that was nuts and surely they could do some triage... In the end I gave up my spot for her.. And I suggested her parents (who were very working class migrants) lodge a complaint as I would be doing (and I did). My point is they already have the systems in place, but, as with Chris Minns, it is the political and management will to do it. I would suggest your "Super Medical Troubleshooting Team" will only act when something goes wrong, and unless they control the purse strings and policy, their recommendations will go the same way the coroners, the AMA, and the hospitals own boards go - as recommendations - and there are people that do that now. And, I think in a previous post somewhere you mentioned these troubleshooting teams should be able to fire at will or words tot hat effect. That is the last thing we want. It is expensive to train medical staff of all types and they don't just fall off trees, so firing should be a last resort for clear cases of breaches of competence (ongoing), conduct or security. If we were to fire them because they made a mistake, even a bad one, you would find we have very fiew medical staff left, and they would be too hesitant to do anything for fear of being fired, and people would be discouraged from entering the professions. So, no, we aren't joking, nor being cruel. Thee are systems in place that already do what you ask, but there is no American style "Die Hard" teams.. they are just a hollywood fantasy. Can the existing systems be improved? Of course.. so maybe you should focus your attention on looking for the candidates who are most likely to do so... Not to throw the baby out with the bathwater.

Is that Chump with the military?

Oh.. the ACCC and every hospital may well fit that bill... You can thank me for letting you know, later...

Yes.. an overhaul of the taxation system, globally, is overdue. Though, given most of these major corporations represent the living pollies will make after they are finished being pollies, combined with the power of persuasion that their resources brings means little will change and it will be the little fellow that continues to pay, while the corporations benefit from the education and health systems.

I took a look at the pub is its price has been reduced by $50K to $350K. Another $100K drop and its worth buying to turn into a house.. No airfield too close, though, which is the big downer for me.

Nope.. Not in this case. Because it was claimed that HRs were of such poor quality, clearly my father's was built on a Friday arvo or Monday morning, to be the antithesis of its claimed normal build quality... (slight sarcasm in my original post). My father's was a 3 speed column shift manual wagon, 2 tone light brown/white, and had a "spoiler" I guess on the top of the rear, which was stock for it. It was a '66. I have maintained for a very long time that nostalgia is the most expensive commodity on earth (at least in the western world) because the amount we pay for it, is much more that the things themselves are worth. Here is a list of some HRs for sale (there is one for $130K!!!): https://www.carsales.com.au/cars/holden/hr/. I have to admit, if my father's car came up for sale at the price most of them are going for, in the condition they are advertised at, I wold not bat an eyelid, as I am buying nostalgia, or a memory... If I was in the market for a "collectible" Aussie car, even though they don't seem to have the demand of the others, I would probably buy one anyway, as I think that they are the best looking holdens of that era, inside and out (well, not including the HX and HZ). The HQ, to me is the ugliest inside and out I have ever seen. But, as an A grade export bogan, I do find myself frequenting this site occasionally: https://www.australianmusclecarsales.com.au/cars/1978-ford-falcon-xc-cobra-no170-58l-tbar-auto-245401 Haven't been on for a while, but have just seen a nice looking Ford XC Cobra, which is another one that I really like. When I first found this site, about 7 years ago, there was one on there for about $150K. I though that was expensive.. Turns out, it looks like it would have been a very good investment.

I honestly don't know which way this election will go. In the last election, the ALP should have creamed it in, but they only won by one seat and the primary vote was a tad over 30%. They are not very good numbers at all. Yes, they historically won a by-election as a sitting government, but that was during their honeymoon period and I wonder even half way into their government whether that would recur. The fact that Dutton was able to post any gains in the polls is a difficult pill to swallow, but apparently over the last few weeks, his polling popularity has decreased. The Voice seems to have been more damaging electorally than it should have. If Spacey's views are representative of a decent enough segment of the population, it would put the ALP in a precarious situation indeed, unless they were prepared to second preference the ALP. Sadly, out pollies are are a reflection of the perceived view of the electorate and, certainly for a lot of people, struggling to put food on the table and a roof over the head of your family. let alone have any left over for enjoying life is a big issue at the moment. and Australia started off as an already expensive place to live. Sadly, most people don't see too much further than their noses, and things like how climate change, corruption, security independence, and economic sovereignty and its bigger impact even a few years away is lost on most people. I was listening to BBC Radio 4 discussing the desire of the US to takeover Greenland and quite apart from the security and mineral wealth, they are also interested in the vast reserves of fresh water, of which the world is running out of! But if you said to people we're slugging you and extra, say, $200/year on your water bill which will go direct to buttressing and bolstering fresh water supplies, which will become critical in 20 years amidst a cost of living crisis, what do you think the response would be? Dutton has already parroted "If your worse off then you were three years ago, vote for me" type rhetoric. The lazy press will parrot that, especially the Murdoch press (I have noted that the SMH and The Age seem to take a more balanced approach at the moment). The press can parrot it, but they should also be informing us that it is not necessarily the correct question to ask - and rather how has our performance been compared to our peers globally being affected by the same circumstances. But, how many people would read beyond the quote rather than stop and think, "Yeah.. bastards.. I am voting for Dutton"? But, if you look at Australia's performance, it has been up there with the best of our peers. Just look at what has happened in the UK.. Starmer is a bit like Albo in that he is not a very charismatic sort of bloke, at least publicly through the press, and has been copping a wallop as a result. Labour's first budget was in reality as much austerity they could do given the promises around taxation they made before the election, which is in a similar vain as Albo's. However, they inherited a basket case of an economy, where the conservatives concealed over £26bn in what effectively was an overdraft... Yet, Labour got rammed in the press for taking the action they did, despite the Office of Budget Responsibility launching an investigation into the previous government concealing financial information and cooking the books. There are three PMs I could not believe Australia voted for.. Howard (who is the real culprit behind our energy price increases through his deals with othe countries to give away our energy with very little contribution in the form of royalties and taxes, while now Australia having to import gas!!), Abbott, who is a bigger clown that his more famous namesake of comedic origin, and ScoMo, because people were scared of policies, particularly removal of negative gearing that would have... hmmmm... not resulted in the massive property and rental price inflation we have today.. The reality is people have their biases and will look for anything to support it. Just look at one of our residents who parrot that it would have meant first nations people effectively running the country, without being able to provide one shred of fact/evidence to support it, but in the face of statements from ex, High Court and Supreme Court judges, constitutional lawyers and even and admission by Dutton himself, still cannot shake that fictional belief. This is what both parties are up against.

May 3.. Only seems like yesterday we had the last one Let the muck begin

Was typing in a hurry, other others' subsequent posts expounded the idea. Apart from the bit that they never learned COBOL, I find it hard to believe they couldn't work with the data. If the programming language was COBOL, chances are the data would be stored in a relational database, which, if on IBM, would likely be DB2; if on Unix/Linux, most likely be Oracle, and if on MS Windows Server, could be either Oracle or MS SQL Server. Although if on IBM, it could be Oracle, or ADABAS as well. There may be others.. has been a while since I have written COBOL. Each of these relational databases use a standard language, SQL (Structured Query Language), to access the data. It could be that they are on some Big Data repository, but again, there would be some standard interface, including butchered versions of SQL. I very much doubt they would store such data using as simple or binary files accessed directly from the language and that goes for any language - C, C++, Java, Python, C#, just to name a few of the more modern languages. The overhead of writing ones own routines to efficiently store and access the data, as well as maintained data integrity, scalability, security, guaranteed recovery, and, well general ACIDity of the data (https://www.databricks.com/glossary/acid-transactions) as well as transaction management is huge, and when you consider the data will have to be distributed and concurrently accessed by hundreds, if not thousands of users. But even if they decided to use native files and implement all of the above, learning COBOL quickly enough to run programs, get and understand the data is not hard for a seasoned programmer. In fact, once you're a tech whizz, reading any language is pretty well easy because regardless of what language you are using, they all have pretty well much the same computer science constructs (well COBOL is limited in some areas compared with the languages I mentioned above, but if you have learned any of those other languages, COBOL would be a doddle to read). Its a bit like some people who can understand some spoken languages enough, but not speak the language. And in any case, any file written by one language can be read by any other language on that platform. So, I tend to agree with this:

well criticized!

Well, it's the beginning of round 3 of the AFL season, and this is another seaosn I will be sitting out of the betting.. There are two teams I would consistently bet against, but so far, none I would consistently bet for. If I see odds that are clearly misaligned to the teams playing, I may go for a single £5 bet, but thus far, I am just going to enjoiy the game.

Police have confirmed the man who fatally fell from the roof of a nightclub was not a bouncer.

For Chump, literally a quicky, but here goes: "The only person Chump ever hired who was actually qualified to to their job was.... Stormy Daniels."

It may be true. They may have long deceased and long not being paid, since them being decease...

I don't think that is a good idea. What if the performance of the government is that bad, that removing them is the best option?

(think we had that one a couple of posts ago)

I must be a genus...

The prime minister sort of enjoys the privilege of being able to call an election to occur at any time up to a maximum of three years since either the last election, or swearing in the the parliament after the election - I can't exactly recall which. The process is the prime minister asks the governor general to dissolve parliament and authorise an election on a said date. The convention is that the GG will agree and dissolve parliament, at which point the sitting government is a caretaker government only performing admin tasks until the election; no new policy or initiatives are to be implemented. Of course, as conventions, they are not enforceable. The GG does not have to agree, and the government, as infamously done by SFM and the Lib premier of Vic signed up to oblige their successive government during this period. If the PM has not requested the GG to dissolve parliament and set an election date within the three year period, the GG will do so of his or her own accord. So, the PM mus call an election within the three year period, but has some liberty to do so beforehand. There are other ways to call an election. In theory, the GG can dissolve parliament at any time and call an election. But, generally, it can be forced politically, through double dissolutions, which is a great way for te sitting government to force an early election when the ar riding a popularoty wave but can see clounds on the horizon.. And of course, an opposition with numbers can, as well, aka 1975. The only thing I see wrong with the current set up in Aus is that it is too easy to call an early election; I think it should require something like in the UK, where 2/3 vote of parliament is required to allow an early election.

Actually, it is a serious response. Did QANTASS offer increased capacity and lower prices? Is QANTASS owned by the Government,? No conflicts of interest?

Like deny Qatar Airlines application for more slots?

Wasn't worded well; they will characterise media raising the issue as the whiny left media

And then go to the fishmonger!

I get the disdain for including a journo, and then the disdain for yet another extortion raquet. But I can't help but think this was a planned PR stunt for the voters. I would guess it is getting harder to justify some of the crap they are doing even to their supporters, so come out and show them that they have to bail out Europe again, and sow further division. The MAGA manacs will be cheering how great America is that they have to come to the aid of baby Europe.. I am sure Eruope has the means to deal with the Houtis, but the US are probably not letting them. Notice, there is no defence official? I would find it very hard to believe if it were really about making a decison, they wouldn't have a defence official in there, for someone to blame if it all goes wrong. I have changed my tune that it is reasonable that Chump didn't know about it.. this is PR gold to them. And the whiny left wing media complaining about a storm in a teacup to boot (how they will spin it).

On the first question - to be honest, I don't know too much of the detail. I doubt Priti Patel ever treated anyone fairly, however, she is a politician and in the UK, they still do not control the courts. Did the courts treat Assange fairly? I have no idea. Did they treat him in accordance with the law, which sometimes is not fair (remembering, fair is a subjective concept)? Yes. Aboslutely. Otherwise his case would have been dispensed with very quickly. In fact, theere were reports that if it was not such a high profile case, the final leave to appeal, which I think was to the Supreme court - this highest court in the land - would probably not have been granted. As I recall, the British courts temporarily refused the extradition order on the grounds that they were not convinced he would receive a fair trial. Apparenlty Sweden also dropped their request for extradition based on an alleged sexual offence, too. Re Russia being a communist country - yes - in name, and in some ways in structure - yes the factors of production were centrally owned and controlled.. sort of.. except that in today's terms, billions were funelled into Swiss bank accounts for the elite, but it was hardly governing these resources for the people. Communist Russia/USSR has always been an autocracy claiming a vel of communism. The problem is power corrupts, and absolute power absolutely corrupts... However, if they maintained a democracy with a communist constituion, maybe it would have been proper communism and worked better.