Category: In the News

Last week’s news (28/7/14)

On By longandshortofitallIn In the NewsLeave a comment

Another week goes by, papers are printed, sites are updated (cough) and networks try to make horrible tragedy as engaging and entertaining as possible.

To start with are the aeronautical disasters of the TransAsia flight brought down by stormy weather and low visibility over Taiwan on Wednesday, resulting in 38 dead including the 4 crew (though thankfully 10 survivors managed to crawl from the wreckage), and the Air Algerie flight that crashed over Africa on Thursday, killing all 110 passengers and 6 crew. I don’t want to say any more than that it’s shocking that such disasters should occur so close together and so soon after what happened to MH17, and that it’s good that at least some survivors made it out of the TransAsia flight.

The announcement that Australian Federal Police (supported by members of the Australian Defence Force) would be heading to the Ukraine to join and assist the force of Dutch officers in securing the MH17 crash site was met with some criticism this week. Some of this criticism was that the Australian government was overplaying its hand. Others thought that the deal signed between Australia and Ukraine that included ‘contingencies’ allowing AFP and ADF personnel to be armed was ‘nuts,’ fearing that having armed Aussies around might provoke the pro-Russian separatists or something. Given that the AFP and ADF have more than a little experience in conflict zones (such as the Solomon Islands, Fiji, East Timor, Iraq, Afghanistan, Cambodia, Somalia and the list goes on) you’d think that they might just know what they’re doing. Interestingly enough, while the current force active in Ukraine are unarmed (something Deputy Federal Police Commissioner Andrew Colvin has expressed concerns about), the Foreign Minister Julie Bishop has said that the Dutch will be signing a similar agreement with the government in Kiev allowing for armed ‘contingencies’.

San Diego Comic Con happened this weekend, where people were disappointed by the lack of big announcements or reveals from Marvel, we got our first look at Wonder Woman from DC (my brain says the costume’s pretty badarse but my heart just isn’t feeling it), and a 64 year old woman was hit by a car trying to escape marauding zombies. I shit you not. Anyway, the first trailer for Mad Max Fury Road was shown and it was… good? I think it was good. A lot happened that looked pretty cool but… yeah. Check it out. I’m a little concerned that with a bigger budget it might have lost a bit of charm. But hey, let’s see where this angry street takes us.

In NSW an unfortunate drama started to come to a conclusion yesterday when Mr Vic Alhadeff, a Jewish community leader (chief executive of the NSW Jewish Board of Deputies no less) resigned from his government appointed position as chairman of the NSW Community Relations Commission. Mr Alhadeff came under fire after he sent out an email (to members of the Jewish community) a couple of weeks ago titled ‘Israel under fire’ that condemned Hamas while glossing over Israel’s role in the violence, angering Muslim leaders across the state. His apology (for the outrage, not the commentary) didn’t help and quite a few prominent Islamic leaders boycotted an iftar dinner held as NSW state parliament house to mark Ramadan that Mr Alhadeff attended. Despite having the continued support of Premier Mike Baird, many claimed Mr Alhadeff’s position as CRC chair had become untenable and apparently he finally agreed (though it seems he still stands by the comments).

What happened in the news last week? (21/07/14)

On By longandshortofitallIn In the NewsLeave a comment

Alright, so I haven’t written anything in two weeks. Nobody’s read anything so it doesn’t matter too much. Still trying to figure out my voice and all that. We’re getting there though.

Anyway. The big story was obviously the loss of 298 lives when MH17 was shot down over pro-Russian rebel territory in the Ukraine. The west, including the USA and Australia have made clear their belief that Russia was involved in some way, though Mr Putin and the Russian media seem to be of the opinion that it was Kiev and Ukrainian state military forces that did the deed. The weight of evidence, even if it is largely circumstantial, seems to be against Russia in this case. The real question is a matter of degrees: just how involved was Russia? Did they supply the missiles or just teach their local proxies how to use launchers captured from the Ukrainian military? Will they merely hinder investigative efforts or go for a full-blown cover-up? I will say I’m liking PM Tony Abbot’s plan to bring a resolution before the UN Security Council demanding an independent investigation (how will China vote I wonder), and I’m a little disappointed by the lack of noise coming from Europe beyond the half-hearted groaning that allowed Ukraine to get this bad in the first place.

In Australia the Carbon Tax has been repealed. It’s definitely a victory for the Coalition, but a bitter one. I’m sure that Labor are enjoying the irony of the PM and Cabinet being forced to kowtow to Clive Palmer and his PUP after all the flak Julia Gillard had to cop for her alliance with the Greens (SCHADENFREUDE!). Repealing the Carbon Tax hasn’t helped Mr Abbot in the polls either, where anger over the budget and an unrepentant Treasurer continues to dominate hearts and minds.

Israel has invaded Gaza, and isn’t that just depressing as hell. You’d think that both sides would be bored of this by now, I’m pretty sure the rest of the world is. As always it’s the innocent bystanders who seem to be suffering the worst of it, not the blokes lobbing the rockets (and that counts for both sides of the border). ISIS (or is it ISIL? IS? ISI?) are still sitting quite happily in Iraq, but it looks like the Kurds will soon be raising a flag over an independent Kurdistan (or Republic of Kurdistan, or whatever else they wanna call it). This could have both a stabilising and destabilising effect on the region since Kurds are a substantial minority in four countries. I hope it works for them, it’d be nice to read about some good news coming from the Mid East.

Rupert Murdoch tried to buy Time Warner for 80 billion dollars. They said no, concerned that it was too little for the risks involved (basically that regulating bodies would say no). Here’s hoping they continue to say no, since I can’t see how giving Mr Murdoch control over CNN and HBO could possibly help competition, but the man who would be television news king is not the type to back off easily.

Ian Thorpe’s come out of the closet in one of those moments when the content is less surprising than the announcement. To join the bandwagon (yes, late I know but better than never), good for him and here’s hoping he finds some peace and happiness with himself now he doesn’t have to hide such a fundamental part of his identity.

In pop culture the big news is that (in the main comic book universe) the mantle of Captain America is being taken up from a de-powered Steve Rogers by black character Sam Wilson (formerly The Falcon), and the current/old Thor is being replaced with a new Thor who is similarly tall and blonde but with the key difference of being a woman (with a uterus and everything), adding some fantastic diversity to the Avengers roster. Along with this is the somewhat spoiled announcement about the upcoming death of Archie, who is apparently gonna go down taking a bullet for his gay, pro-gun control, politically active friend. Almost makes me wish I actually read comics.

Finally, after a tweet or two by screenwriter Gary Whitta, Mark Ruffalo (who bears a striking resemblance to the late great Peter Falk) has confirmed that he has been approached about a possible modern remake of one of my personal favourite detective shows, Columbo. While I’m not normally one to get excited about modern remakes and reboots, ahem, OHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGODOHMYGOD! COLUMBO! SOMEONE MAKE THIS HAPPEN!

The news last week… that I cared about (6/7/14)

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So, let’s talk about the news this past week. This is something I’m thinking about doing weekly, a sort of quick run down of the goings on in news and politics that caught my attention. Not a summary of everything, just a bit of commentary.

In Iraq and Syria, ISIL (the terrorist organisation formerly known as ISIS) has declared an Islamic Caliphate and demanded that Sunni groups including Al-Qaeda submit to their authority. The Iraqi army is claiming that they’ve started to push ISIL back (or is it now called ISIS, formerly ISIL? Or something else completely? I’m honestly not sure), something which the newly-minted Caliph and his followers are firmly denying. The rest of the world seems to be wondering when these morons will realise that simply declaring yourself an independent nation does not cause the bureaucracies, institutions, laws, tax-codes and fiscal mechanisms required to govern and maintain a country to spontaneously spring from the earth or fall from the heavens. It’d be funny if not for all the people they’ve killed, are likely to kill, and are currently having to live within the Caliphate’s unrecognised borders.

Moving to lighter news in Australia. Prime Minister Tony Abbot put his foot squarely in his mouth (again) while talking about the value of foreign investment when he described pre-British-colonised-Australia as “unsettled, or, um, scarcely settled.” This was followed immediately by the collective groans of people like me asking “Did he really just say that?”, by the hordes of left-wing stereotypes who seem to take great glee in pointing at the PM and Coalition and yelling “RACIST!” (SCHADENFREUDE!), followed by a whole lot of groans from Mr Abbot’s people also asking “Did he really just say that?” It was a stupid thing to say, one that he’ll cop some flak for until the next time Scott Morrison strings together a sentence longer than “I don’t comment on operational matters.” What really disappoints me though is that you can use Australia as an example of positive foreign investment in nation-building, British Imperial investment, without essentially declaring that the pre-European Aboriginal population doesn’t count. Mind you a big part of that argument involves casually shrugging your shoulders and saying “at least it wasn’t Spain.” I think I might go into more detail later this week.

In video games this week the conversation over whether developers, publishers and PR teams understand that women play games, and maybe would like to sometimes play as a woman too. First upcoming game Far Cry 4‘s creative director Alex Hutchinson making a point that half the game’s main antagonists and one of the main allies (as well as a good chunk of the nameless NPCs) are female. Hell, the game’s “packed to the gills with women.” For now, we’ll just call this lame as hell. Second was a Finnish Hearthstone e-sports tournament that only allowed male players, because the International e-Sports Federation has been segregating men and women in their competitions. The Finns (God bless’em) petitioned for this to be changed, and the IeSF (who did actually have their hearts in the right place, believe it or not) have changed it. And there was much rejoicing. Yay.

 

Anyway, I quite like this. It’s giving me a few ideas about what to write about and how to start organising the blog. Let’s do this again next week.