A P-PLATER who hit speeds of 255km/h in a high performance rally car during a police chase from NSW to Melbourne has been jailed for three months.
It's pretty clear this guy is not a complete genius; anyone who speeds on the Hume is looking for trouble- with the cops, a truck, a tree etc.
In the TV news, they went to lengths to point out the car was the oh-so-fast Subaru WRX STi, a rare and wonderful car in the right hands at the right time.
...just not in this guy's hands. His defense went a little like this:
Defence lawyer Stan Waites said Pickering was developmentally delayed, and his parents had gone through great anguish to make him recognise he had a problem.
Questions: 1/ WTF is "developmentally delayed"? Late bloomer? Total moron? Immature? Mentally retarded? 2/ How does a "Developmentally delayed" guy afford a $70,000 car? 3/ If he can't afford it, did his mum and dad buy it, thereby reducing their "great anguish" factor? 4/ Can people who are "developmentally delayed" get a license nowadays?
So here's what he got:
Magistrate Robert Kumar sentenced him to nine months jail, but suspended six months. He cancelled Pickering's license for five years, and fined him $2000.
In my mind, the jail sentence is appropriate as he has many car related offence priors (he has lost his license in multiple states) and the risks he took with other people's lives mean a custodial sentence is correct.
The $2000 fine is neither here nor there.
The license suspension for five years is woefully inadequate. If his defense has said he effectively has a mental issue that makes him an ongoing menace behind the wheel, then cancelling his license and banning him from driving for life is the only way forward.
I do not understand why we leave the door open for people to drive again. If he had a gun license and was firing bullets in the air recklessly, we would take the guns away for life. There would not be a suspension; "Are you ready to stop firing in the air randomly? Oh? You ARE? Good then, here they are!". We would just say "that's it bubba, you have blown your gun license"
But this guy could be driving again in five years, and frankly I do not want to share a city with him.
THE Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams is right. Why not have a "smorgasbord" of laws. In our enlightened multicultural society we need to be "sensitive", "tolerant" and "inclusive".
If Muslims want to stone their adulterous women, why should we object? If Aborigines want to reject "white man" laws and live by their traditional tribal laws, then we should accommodate this. Yes, we should invite all cultures to pick and choose from a smorgasbord of laws and, if groups like the anarchists want to reject all laws, how can we discriminate? Yes, bring on the utopia, but not before I have time to migrate to a country that has pride in its culture and safe streets.
Tomorrow is the Australian federal election, and while I have been known to spout my political views in public forums from time to time, I have not done so as part of my media career as there is no place for it.
As a result, this blog has steered clear of politics also.
"THIS is one of the hardest columns I will write. John Howard has been the finest prime minister Australia has had.
He has overseen extraordinary economic success, created the conditions for a whole new class of aspirational Australians to prosper from the inevitable forces of globalisation, confronted the scourge of terrorism and has fundamentally realigned the political landscape in this country on so many fronts. Under Howard it became cool to be a conservative. He rebuilt a political philosophy of individual responsibility for a new generation. His legacy is profound. From workplace reform to welfare to indigenous politics, to our sense of national identity, Howard has changed the nation in a way very few leaders ever do. Each step rankled his opponents as they clung to old orthodoxies. Yet Howard, through sheer dint of character and intellectual fortitude, prevailed."
wait.... I was going to write a long break down of why a columnist this biased is a waste of space, but on re-reading her comments I vomited a little into my mouth and now need to go and spit this out and rinse my mouth with plutonium.
I am taking the Ms Fits option; do not engage an enemy that is so stupid and beneath you.
"KEVIN has done it, not just once but twice, as he confessed last night. Brendan Nelson has done it, when he was 20. Alexander Downer says he has never done it when on official business. Tony Abbott won't talk about whether he's done it, because he doesn't want to fib. And nobody quite dares to ask John Howard whether he's been to a strip club."
"Nobody dares?" More like "No one gives a crap" If John Howard has never been to a strip club, then he ought to make a up a story that he has!
Me? Oh yes, I have been to the odd strip club. Twice this year alone. (once for MY bucks, once for Donny's). In fact I would like to confess here and now that I fell asleep during my last lap dance as I was "tired and emotional" That's how much I rate titty bars. Meh.
Political considerations aside ("Are the women empowered by the money and position they hold over the men?" vs. "Why do university student women with all those brains and education so often stoop top such a debasing job?" blah blah), if you are a group of 10 or so men, then best of luck getting into a bar/nightclub that isn't a strip club at 1am on a Friday/Saturday night.
I remember my old mate Dan Tehan's bucks night- we ended up in a strip club at about 1am despite trying to get into about 3 bars as a group and even failing when we broke up into groups of two. In the end we could either go to a gay bar or a boob bar.
"PHEW, Live Earth is over. The seven concerts on seven continents featuring a bunch of jet fuel-addicted rock stars summed up the problem with much of the talk about climate change. Hypocrisy aside, the climate change rockers and other zealots would have us believe there is no problem more uniquely modern than climate change. When it comes to mapping out solutions to this most 21st century of problems, history can teach us nothing. We are on our own. Right? Well, actually, no. Wrong. Dead wrong."
Yes Janet, maybe history can teach us.
For starters, I have no problem with Rock Stars (and Al Gore et al) flying around the globe to spread the message. It's a standard line the deniers: "if they are anti Co2, why do they fly?". It's so tired and lame that I guess I can only address it by saying this:
Its the same as those who sent troops to Iraq to fight for peace. See, you create more of the problem (war/Co2) to prevent/reduce the problem (war/Co2).
The difference is that you can't really fight for peace in a country like Iraq. The more you fight, the more you encourage fringe thinkers into becoming outright fighters against you.
In contrast, people can get on board with reducing their carbon foot print. They don't have to kill anyone to do it. They can save money into the bargain. win/win.
Still, as a national columnist it's difficult to give any real thinking to this. You just have to job out something controversial and topical every three or so days, so skipping on the thinking part is de rigeur.
And before I get shouted down for being a motoring journalist talking about carbon footprints etc, I'd like to point out the following:
Despite all my talking/writing/blogging about cars, I don't actually own one.
I catch public transport a lot- I have a 10 trip ticket in my wallet at all times.
When I do need to make a vehicular trip, I ride my low carbon output motorcycle, or ride my bicycle or, heaven forbid, I walk.
I am about to start offsetting my car tests.
I have been pushing via my on air appearances hybrid cars (special on the 18th July, already did a feature on the Volt electric car in December of 2006, and called for F1 to be a hybrid category in the coming years)
This needs a campy voice over: "As an Illegal immigrant, you will get to see all that a detention centre can offer: self harm, children crying, riots and beatings... Are you into water sports? Then you MUST try water-boarding!
Our a la carte slops bin will give provide the nutrition you need to sit around for 5+ years while your application is stuffed around. If you are really lucky you may be declared stateless- this will allow you to stay on indefinitely and really see all that an 8' X 4' cell can offer!
Are you a mentally ill Australian with an accent? Well this is the place for you! Forget treatment and loved ones, why not try treatment-free sub-human jail conditions?!"
For those of us in sunny Australia, the name Barack Obama means very little.
I know about him thanks to my ever-so-politcally-aware brother Stephen, who is a very enthusiastic supporter of Obama and suggested that I watch the following speeches from the Democratic National Convention back in 2004: Part 1, 9:35
Barack Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, to Barack Hussein Obama Sr. of Nyangoma-Kogelo, Siaya District, Kenya, and Ann Dunham of Wichita, Kansas. His parents met while both were attending the East-West Center of the University of Hawaii at Manoa, where his father was enrolled as a foreign student. In his 1995 memoir, Dreams from My Father, Obama describes a nearly race-blind early childhood. He writes: "That my father looked nothing like the people around me –- that he was black as pitch, my mother white as milk –- barely registered in my mind."
He's an amazing speaker, a prodigious writer and a true thinker. I hope that if he can't be president (addressing whether the USA is ready for a black or female president is the stuff books are made of), he can still be an influential politician who delivers to his country a world view and can engage in the odd piece of navel gazing (or shoe gazing, I'm never sure which is better).
He's starting his run for president early. I was prompted to post about him as the US papers are reporting about him a lot lately:
I love this letter. It starts out edgy, then migrates to mad town. The last paragraph is just fantastic. ALL APPLAUD!
"Conceivable issues for women at war
RE 'Let women fight' ( The Age, 2/10). There is a slight problem with the Geneva Conventions, which were drawn up before affirmative action and equal employment opportunities existed. Females and transgender soldiers are not covered. China, Israel, Russia and Vietnam have scrapped their female combat soldier experiments.
Could the Government be sued by an offspring if a soldier, in the early stages of pregnancy, is bayoneted, blasted, gassed, inoculated or shot? Military medical personnel would have to carry out pregnancy tests before X-raying incoming casualties. Possibly females would have to be withdrawn from a combat unit after conception or sign a contract to the effect they will not become pregnant while posted to a combat unit.
Politicians should direct their legislative energies towards outlawing married soldiers and their partners from having affairs with other soldiers or their partners, as in the US. The current no-intimate-contact-on-military-duty policy does not safeguard soldiers from colleagues who are serial breakers of trust. This is a serious threat to military unit cohesion. Chris Gardiner, Dundas, NSW"
Yes! Here's the campaign: "If ya wear army boots- no roots!"
