2007 has been the year in which Britney Spears finally became too tragic to make satire out of (for what would be the point?). A year in which scientists decided that even if one or two Baiji dolphins remain in the Yangtze river, they are now too hidden by mud and the noise of propellers to be found. A year in which our government both opened a big fuck off motorway through Wellington and announced a “carbon trading” scheme seemingly designed to allow energy companies to charge more for hydroelectricity and claim this increase prevents carbon emissions.
A year in which we got one year closer to 2012.
Current events within Aotearoa were dominated by child abuse: small children treated like rag dolls for a few years until their bodies fail and they fall into the media spotlight, where we all get to feel outraged. This led to the “anti-smacking bill” and a $14-million government ad campaign. Such measures have good intentions, but can they enforce basic empathy to bloom within the minds of those who just don’t want to be empathic? I’m guessing no… National shined up its new nose with a chirpy key, but kept saying dumb things like “there is no war in Iraq”. Which is kinda like saying that child abuse has officially been declared over and only exists “unofficially” in defiance of the government.
Best Moments in National News
May 23: TVNZ CEO Rick Ellis tells the Maori Affairs select committee that Police Ten-7 represents a “Maori perspective” on mainstream television (so that he sneak a slice of the Maori-content funding largely given to Maori TV). When Radio NZ host Kathryn Ryan asks how this is so, he claims he doesn’t know, and was only reading the names off a sheet handed to him by an assistant. Ryan points out that he knows very well the “perspective” he was talking about is the back-of-a-police-car perspective. Ellis has no reply. Classic.
June 17: The Human Rights Tribunal rules that men and women employed in the same fish-gutting jobs at Talley’s fish-processing plants must be the same wages. “Pole dancing is a job best suited to women. Fish filleting, on the other hand, is more a job for the blokes”, replied Talley’s fisheries boss Andrew Talley. This despite the fact that his fastest fish-filleting employees include crazy old women who have been in the job for decades and can out-fillet any young buck. Moron.
Playing Sports Is Good For Your Constitution
In August, Judo expert Paul Phoenix left the world of Playstation’s Tekken, changed his name to Richie McCaw and entered the employ of Goblin Lord Graham. Phoenix was to lead the Goblin Lord’s elite Black Guard on a quest for the Holy Grail, which is held in a castle in England. After vanquishing four pitiful defence units, the Black Guard traversed the Welsh Mountains to make combat against the Caveman and his blue knights. Their armour stained an ominous grey, the Guard suffered ignominious defeat and Phoenix once more slunk back into the world of Tekken, where he picked up where he left off – attempting to flatten Heihachi with a round-house kick.
Best Moments in International News
Unfortunately we have had nothing to match the greatest moments of international diplomacy from 2006: Bush’s “Yo, Blair” ramble at the G8, the Christmas jingle Ban Ki Moon sung at his swearing-in as UN Secretary General, or Chavez’ “el Diablo Bush” rant at the UN General Assembly. What we have had is the continuous pissing contest between Bush and Iranian leader Ahmadinejad, both of whom are really just affable redneck clowns in the service of evil bomb-merchants. Both are famous for their amusing gaffes – Ahmadinejad telling Columbia University that there are no gay folk in Iran is sheer comedic genius.
Both are rather fond of the death penalty. Bush declared the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a “terrorist organisation” in order to justify any future attack on that nation, so Ahmadinejad of course retaliated by declaring that CIA is also a bit terroristy itself.
In May, an emu was shot trying to cross into Switzerland from Germany. The emu evaded international police for several hours, leading a fleet of patrol cars on a 50km/h chase. After vets failed to subdue the bird with tranquilliser darts, hunters had to be called in. Poor emu.
Facebook happened. Russia tried to claim the North Pole while her President swaggered around without his shirt on, to try and make up for the fact that she is a political castrati. France decided they prefer an angry little man to a bit of a ditz, and elected Nicholas Sarkozy to lead them into economic productivity. Following the Ethiopian takeover of Somalia in December 2006, Ethiopian-backed Islamist factions continue to burn each other in the streets of Mogadishu. In the Sudan, Janjaweed gunmen continue to lynch African Union peacekeepers. Monks get fed up with zodiac warlords fucking up Burma in protest. The Monks are no more. Meanwhile, the world of warcraft kept sucking the children of the affluent West into its warm arms of obesity, occupational overuse syndrome and poor eyesight.
From the Mess O’ Potamia to Cthulhu’s Return
the boy that you loved is the man that you fear
Iraq, the cancer that most smarts and sears underneath all these boils, began another year of general slaughter with Saddam’s camera-phone hanging ceremony. Two weeks later Bush rejected the gradual withdrawal recommended by the Pentagon’s Iraq Study Group, and has since committed a further 30,000 troops to Baghdad and Anbar province. The result? Militias moved around, while the main US anti-Qaeda ally in Anbar (Sheikh Abdul-Sattar Abu Risha) was assassinated. US forces erected a wall through Baghdad to keep Sunnis and Shi’ites apart; locals rightly protested, since a large proportion of them have mixed- faith marriages; the US are simply imitating militias in forcing such families to split apart. Fo’ shame.
Meanwhile, Baghdad is still the most dangerous city in the world. Iraq’s inflation has hit 50 per cent, over two million have fled (including at least 12,000 doctors), and only one third of the remaining have clean drinking water. Each month two to three thousand Iraqis are killed by US troops, Islamic militants, and private military contractors like the Blackwater men, who are paid far more than a state-employed soldier’s wage, with none of the democratic responsibility. In May, obese President Talabani checked into the private Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota in order to lose weight.
Two months ago, the Pentagon admitted 190,000 weapons have “gone missing” in Iraq. If you’re going to invade a country for whatever reason – be it greed, altruism of both – one presumes you would plan for things like, oh, say rioting, sectarian militias and foreign infiltration, all of which can fuck things up and ruin your profits. And yet somehow we get a $450-billion-plus war without any substantial planning for these things. wow….
Although the rapidly expanding popularity of blogging among Egyptian, Arabian and Persian youth is beginning to break down some of the barriers between the Islamic world and the West, on the whole the Islamic world has looked more and more desperate each day this year. Leading up to July Presidential elections in Turkey, million-strong marches erupted in support of secularism and against fundamentalist leaders, bringing tears of joy to the eyes of us liberal imperialists. But they failed, and Abdullah Gül got to be President. Then in August an 80,000-strong demonstration in Jakarta called for a single Islamic government across the world… Lebanon spirals further out of control as its mixed-faith army is forced to raid refugee camps to stop Fatah al Islam from launching rocket attacks…
In Palestine, following heavy fighting throughout June, Hamastan in Gaza split from Fatahstine in the West Bank, which allowed Fatah to renew its foreign aid endowments, but further sealed Gaza inside itself. However, this all came to an end in October when Enter Shikari came down from their mother ship, took out their valium-pellet ray guns and blasted everyone with intergalactic space battles trance metal. Their alien overlords, having decided that human are unable to solve their own problems, sent Shikari to pacify everyone with the hardcore power of Valium. Although this did stop Israel and Palestine from fighting, it unfortunately left them passive and vulnerable when Cthulhu emerged from the depths of the ocean to reclaim his ancient throne as Lord of Jerusalem. Ooooooh fear his scary tentacles, world, and weep!