24 thoughts on “Weekend reflections”

  1. What do the Friedrich von Hayek experts say on:

    1. Van Hayek had apparently firm views on what universities should achieve:

    “According to the Nobel laureate Friedrich Hayek, social institutions such as universities should be judged by the extent to which they promote human liberty and freedom.” Steven Schwartz, SMH, 16/3/06.

    I do not recall anything specific on universities from my readings of van Hayek. Admittedly, when reading van Hayek decades ago I focused on the economic content of his writing (beside noting the obvious, namely that van Hayek turned to 19th century thinking as a role model of civilisation to hold up against the various versions of dictatorships that had caused horrific human missery in Europe during the early part of the 20th century).

    2. “Priority one: universities must teach free thought”. What does this mean in a non-dictatorial society? For example, there are about 6 billion thoughts at any instant of time – all of them are ‘free’ in more than one sense.

  2. The Sydney Morning Herald is running with a story this morning in which it alleges the new US Ambassador to Australia is a member of the Skulls & Bones secret society, and that Bush may have appointed him, at least in part, on the back of this membership. I’m curious what people’s thoughts are about secret societies, particularly in democracies. My own views are mixed.

  3. Stripping aside all the “Secret Society” stuff, Isn’t Skull and Bones just a Yale University fraternity? Obviously it provides an ongoing social network for those who join it but all of us are members of social networks based on shared experiences of some sort. Anyway, it can’t be all that sinister. John Kerry is a member …..

  4. So, you mean, leaving aside the fact that it’s secret, it’s a society? Well, yeah, but I’m not sure what that proves.

  5. Initially, Skull & Bones catered to the taste of America’s ertsatz-aristocracy for the Gothic.

    The recent vogue for “Buffy” and related rip-offs might have slaked that appetite, but hasn’t.

    I guess intellectual midgets like George W. Bush can never get too much obscurantism.

    Skull & Bones also does Good Works by anonymous donation of monies … many monies.

  6. “So, you mean, leaving aside the fact that it’s secret, it’s a society? Well, yeah, but I’m not sure what that proves.”

    That they’re like the Masons only wth preppier clothing?

  7. The “Weekend Australian” this morning gets dead snarky about Our Duck:

    “Not just any old duck, but the creation of faux philosopher and cartoonist Michael Leunig … It was a misjudged moment of mimsey, as the rest of the world blanked out over the iconography of Melbourne’s diminishing Left-Liberal subculture.”

    As a Melbourne Left-Liberal, let me assure the Oz that we are in rude good health. Once upon a time the authorities used to shut down our plays, ban our songs, send ASIO spooks to report on our nefarious activities. Now they leave us alone.

    Under Gorton, Whitlam and Fraser most of the necessary social legislation was passed to end official harassment and to prosecute many victimless crimes that infuriate conservatives so much.

    Left-Liberalism has always been a minority culture. It’s nice if a lot of people agree with us, but if they don’t then that’s their problem.

    And the Duck does have a special place in our Left-Liberal hearts, ever since the days of the Nation Review.

    And now the world knows about the Duck. The world can choose to find out more if it wants. That has to be a good thing to arise from the Empire Games.

    And the “Weekend Australian”, a newspaper which I’m told is read in other parts of Australia, has contributed its Widow’s Mite to spreading the fame of the Duck.

    Thanks Oz.

    P.S.

    Talking about blanking out over “mimsey”, my Shorter Oxford didn’t carry the word and nothing on Google provided any precise meaning. But let that pass.

  8. whoever wrote “moment of mimsey” was perhaps confused. “Mimsy” (with no “e”) appears in Lewis Carroll’s Jabberwocky poem in Alice Through the Looking Glass. According to Martin Gardner’s Annotated Alice (1960, Bramhall House, NY) mimsy is a nonsense word, also found in The Hunting of the Snark. He notes “In Carroll’s time, according to the Oxford English dictionary, “mimsey” (with an “e”) meant “prim, prudish, contemptible”. Perhaps Carroll had this in mind”. Whatever else it might be, the Leunig duck is not a prim and prudish duck. Perhaps a typo for whimsey? Or a shocking indictment of the state of education of opinion columnists? (irony alert on that last sentence – the Oz has a habit of thundering from the pulpit about declining standards).

  9. Mitchell, editor of the Oz, lost all credibility on any subject with his ‘Manning Clark was a Soviet spy’ fiasco during his all-too easily forgotten stint at the Courier-Mail. At least the Brisbane rag has now adopted the format best suited to its content. At least now it won’t have to camouflage its cheesecake page 3 pix with some flimsy story about skin cancer (sun-beach-exposed flesh: geddit?) or tourism.

  10. The latest edition of The Quarterly Essay features Clive Hamilton on “The Death of Social Democracy in Australia”.

    I hvaen’t read it yet but I suspect it will be of considerable interest to many of thep eople who post here.

  11. Perhaps I was premature in my confidence that the forces of Australian conservatism have long got over their enthusiasm for repression.

    News just in from Tim Longhurst:

    http://www.timlonghurst.com/

    “A satirical website, johnhowardpm.org has been shut down by Melbourne IT at the request of the Australian Government. Two Melbourne IT customer service personnel have claimed that representatives of the Government requested the site be shut down, and Melbourne IT’s Policy Office chose to honour that request without contacting the site’s owner, Richard Neville.”

    Links to the offending articles can be found on the above website.

    This government repression is somewhat ironic because in this weekend’s “Australian” Magazine is an entertaining article on how the Oz trial in London in 1971, starring Richard Neville as the lead defendant, drove the British Establishment mad, establishing free speech as a practice, if not as a principle.

    RWDBs who foam at the mouth over the Danish cartoons imbroglio, would be well advised to study how in the Oz trial Left-Liberals extended and defended the rights that Right Wingers are selectively braying for today.

    An interesting sidelight on this story is the fact that Richard Neville was the first to dub Australia “Oz”. How many people get to rebrand their own nation?

  12. Have you noticed that the ‘Iron Chef’, on s.b.s, is looking less and less democratic?

    One bloke always wins.

  13. I’d posit that Iron Chef is a good metaphor for democracy in Japan itself: all the appearances, bells and whistles, but inherent power structures in the background determines the outcome. A bit harsh, perhaps? But IC leads into Rockwiz which to my mind is a perfect mix of obscure musical references and self-conscious smart arsery. Plus I find Dougal strangely compelling. That man has a way with score cards.

  14. Nick Xenophon has rocketed in the SA elections. His victory in the upperhouse, with more than two quotas, perhaps even eclipsing the landslide towards Rann’s Labor government in interest. There’s a few I know who, for the first time ever, didn’t vote with a party and instead voted for Xenophon. Stubborn and loud independent, making a difference on the edges, but definitely noticed and rewarded by the electorate. Perhaps a few other lone voices should look carefully to SA …

  15. I am a bit sorry that the games didn’t go all the way with the Duck. They went with the skateboarding kid, while they already had two fabulous Leunig characters – Mr Curly, or Vasco Pyjama and the Direction Finding Duck.

    Given the journeys so many athletes made to get here, and the planetary spread of its participating nations, I reckon Vasco and his geographical bird would have been better.

    Let me get polemical: even in attacking the Commonwealth Games Opening, the Murdochistas are playing into the culture wars. They attack the duck, which makes a weird kind of sense to outsiders, but is artistic. Latte-like.

    But for local obscurantism, who can go past Ron Barassi walking on water? I mean, WTF?

    The Fijians will really get that one.

    But that is cool because it is sport.

  16. “But for local obscurantism, who can go past Ron Barassi walking on water?”

    Does that mean Ron is Gary Ablett Senior’s son?

  17. No Mark U, Gary Ablett Snr, is clearly the ‘holy ghost’.

    And Phil, i’m with you on Dougal.
    What a nice young man. Blue singlets may make a comeback and hopefully ‘barrel girls’.

  18. Katz,
    Whether you are “conservative” or “progressive”, possession of the instruments of power will always cause you to try to shut down outlets of a contrary point of view. If the States had any real power left they would be trying to use the local censorship laws to cut down on critisism.
    It is the possession of power itself, not “conservatism” that causes this sort of nonsense. The sooner you realise this, the less one sided your commentary would be, interesting though it currently is.

  20. sdfc,
    If you can read that interpretation into what I have just said then I think there is a lucrative position as a spin doctor in your future – unless you are already in that field.

  21. Tasmania and South Australia comfortably and Beazley Mr 18%. All in one week.

    Quo Vadis?

  22. So its all right because you reckon the states would do it if they could? Not much of an excuse.

  23. I think it was pathetic and gutless of Coonan not to grant a couple of extra licences for TV stations.

    One of the problems with so few players in the media market is that politicians, of whatever persuasion, are mostly too gutless to make policy that might upset their “media mates”.

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