Dana Vale; abortion; Amanda Vanstone; Muslims with a sense of humour

I like abortion. Abortion's fine. I like Dana Vale (left), because she's so conservative, and she's such a skilful own goal kicker, and I do love a really conservative own goal kicker. Alexander Downer revealed himself with his "Things that batter" speech during the 1995 election campaign (his party's slogan was "things that matter" and he quipped mirthfully at a formal dinner that the Liberal domestic violence policy could be dubbed "things that batter"). Then Prime Minister Keating called him the idiot son of the aristocracy, which he never shook, which is why we have John Howard.

I happened to be watching tv last night and there she was, Dana, explaining how Australia is going to become a Muslim state in the near future, what with the rate of mozzie refos and us "aborting ourselves out of existence" and all (which is why abortion's bad, because mozzies are pesky). She was one of 5 conservative women politicians holding a press conference to campaign against the proposal to tranfser power from the Health Minister to health professionals decisions about use of the abortion pill RU486. Out blurted her thing, and no matter how fast her fellow twin set pollie Jackie Kelly could get out words to the effect of "Hmm, well I think Dana's out on her own on that one," it couldn't be fast enough.

Dana's the Minister for Veteran's Affairs, and the Minister Assisting the Defence Minister, the same out of left field thinker who came up with the idea of a Gallipoli theme park on the Mornington Peninsula just out of Melbourne to save uber loyalists the airfare to Turkey (where there are, lets face it, far too many mozzies for safety).

Now Amanda Vanstone has called her fellow minister "dopey". Hymned by faint approbation if you ask me. Amanda is just impossible to dislike, as Phillip Adams observed on last night's LNL.

But I like the mozzie with a sense of humour who published a photo in an Egyptian newspaper of the Queen of Denmark apparently wearing a red bikini.

Jamis Sputnik: a fixed gear factory produced track bike

In my earlier post on bicycles, I talked about beautiful pared down cycles. This is the one that I found so beautiful in the store, the Jamis Sputnik. As my new bike became increasingly cluttered with lights, computer, panier rack, horn and lock, I looked increasingly enviously at the impractical matt black beauty of the enticingly named Sputnik, which is, attractively, only about $800. It looks more startingly beautiful in real life than in this photo. That's the problem with photos of bikes.