Author: Stuart

January 7th 1953 – Johannes Salk was busy working away in his laboratory when he realised he had made a breakthrough – he had invented Polio (which already existed, and killed thousands every year) When his partner informed him they were meant to find a vaccine instead, he washed the results down the drain, but Polio is water borne, so he cleaned it up with Anthrax. The whole thing made Salk feel… mad as hell!

The week’s episode was guaranteed to contain no interviews with network sporting personalities.

Shaun didn’t feel angry about anything this week – maybe perhaps feeling a bit of envy. Of all the deadly sins, he wishes he had another. Maybe sloth, but he couldn’t be bothered changing. Shaun was envious of America (next door to Mexico – stupid country). Things are better there, at least from what he can see from TV. Barack Obama is cool, compared to the Australian parliament, which is very dull. Even Papua New Guinea is more interesting.

Even America’s mistakes are better than ours. And their losses. Queensland is in the red for $100 million, but in America, one man stole $7 billion in a Ponzi scheme. Jocelyn Stick (Veronica), Business Affairs Reporter, explained to Shaun how a Ponzi scheme works, and he seemed pretty taken by the idea.

Julia Gillard is a woman, and she admits it. Recently Julia raised the issue of the glass ceiling for women, saying it was cracked. Sandy Appleby (Tosh), Women’s Affairs Reporter, is concerned that all the men standing on it might fall through onto those women. Maybe a trapdoor should have been installed. The blue stocking movement might be strongest at the gusset, but if the women were on more boards, maybe they would reach the ceiling – metaphorically?

But Gina Rinehart is an exception. She’s sitting on many boards, and looks like getting some seats at Fairfax too. To explain it all, Shaun uses the prism of pop culture, starting with likening it to Citizen Kane, but when only a few understand, he eventually compares her take over of Fairfax to the movie Rock of Ages – “a terrible idea”.

Back to America, or specially, South America, they are celebrating the original Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. Great idea, talking about the saving of the planet when the Mayan calender predicts the end of it.

Tuffy Gorgan (Roz) reported on Craig Jevello, who has been preparing 15 years for the amageddon. He’s got his food supplies sorted, with most of it highly perishable, but he’s avoiding preservatives. His 17 year old dog will keep him company, and he’s got a Kindle for all his books. The council refused his application to install a chimney for his fireplace though. Tuffy refused his invitation to spend a night in the bunker. In a postscript, Shaun revealed Craig was later rushed to hospital with botulism, smoke inhalation, rabies, bullet wounds and dysntry. [Shaun laughed here, but when I saw the taping, he did this straight.]

The days of the old wall calendars might be numbered; good thing, they’d be useless otherwise.

Francis held a debate on the subject of gay marriage, and most of the panel discussing the topic were against it, including a representative of the Families for Family Friendly Australian Families. Child Psychologist Heather Snap was very keen to cite common sense research, such as that being born was important for children. In the end, the panel agreed that two hetrosexual, single sex people could get married, provided there was no intimacy. Even the Sister was satisfied with the absence of sex.

Later, Shaun promised to talk to a representative of Fairfax, who was annoyed that they found out about they jobs via a media company – since when has Fairfax known what was going on?

During the break, Miss Fisher was insistent that while the ABC Wednesday comedy schedule was looking like a victim, her Murder Mysteries were not a comedy, and would be seen among the line up, despite her diva-esque behaviour.

Back on the topic of Gina Rinehart, Elance Feelings discussed some of the mining industry terminology, such as FIFO (fly in fly out), HIHO (helicopter in and out) and TITO (train in and out) but Dido is a singer.

Opinions on “should immigrants be made to speak with an Australian accent” in Top of the Vox Pops varied – “we just took the shelves back to Ikea for a refund.”

Shaun can’t stand sport, so he crossed to Maggie Bathysphere and the ABC sports team who were in London for the Olympics, where most of the budget had already been spent, 3 weeks out. [Writer Michael Ward is hiding at the back of the team] Since nothing was actually happening, the team had been visiting CatsThatLookLikeKerryOBrien.com and iQing Lara Bingle – the first time those two words have been used in the same sentence. They did have some great behind the scenes footage from The Masters, where the famous Green Jacket was constantly adjusted depending on who was in the lead.

Apologies to any Channel 9 viewers who would be offended by seeing a woman talk about sport.

In Know Your Backbencher, a segment looking at the unsung (suu-kyi) members of the Australian Parliament, they focused on little known… Kevin Rudd, who works for his constituents on local issues by consulting with world leaders and always keeps his cool.

Most of us wish to live free and happy lives, and those who don’t should be forced to. In a new segment, Hey No Nanny State!, Shaun discusses our freedoms. Smoking is your right, and Shaun will defend it to your death. Although some government control is required, because a lot of people are idiots. But the new large (mock) packages are rediculous, so Shaun says Hey Nanny No. Violence on trains is out of control, but as long as transit police do as per the Vietnamese, and stay outside the vehicle even when it’s moving, Shaun says Hey Nanny No.

On the subject of bullying, Shaun is against the idea of suing parents of bullies. But he interviews Belinda Tenducca, his former bully, and she makes him think she bullied him because she had a crush on him at school. After she breaks his heart again, and he changes his mind to Hey Nanny Yes.

Finally, Aung Sung Su Chi picked up her Nobel Peace Prize from 1991 – couldn’t they have home delivered it, or at least refrigerated it? Here’s tomorrow’s talkback…

The was also an interview taped with Robyn Nevin, who stars in Queer Lear, but this might end up as web extra or in next weeks episode.

Shaun refused to go on unless he was paid $5000, but was happy to accept Cabcharges. Lucky, because tonight one of the stories was about police holding a man over a fire. This week, the show proclaimed to be “riding the 24-hour news cycle drug-free.”

When the audience wouldn’t hold their applause, Shaun fired a gun into the air. He did apologise for the over-the-top reaction. He was quite angry because how he felt about something and what he thought about it were different, and that made him furious. It was the story of Nick D’Arcy and Kenrick Monk being punished by the AOC for being photographed wielding guns in California. If they can’t use social media, how can they expected to tweet their emoticons?

Maggie Bathysphere (Emily) from ABC Sport felt it had been blown out of proportion, just because one had once lied to police and the other once punched someone in the face – who hasn’t?

Black Caviar, in comparison, is very well behaved. Punky Voltaren (Tosh) reported on her prospects racing at Royal Ascot, and assured Shaun that while she had a lot riding on her, it would only be the jockey during the race.

Shaun is concerned about sport on an international level, which does often raise national pride to the level of nationalism, which if taken too seriously is taken to the level of national socialism – then it’s no longer about including multiple countries from a race, but about excluding various races from a country.

Maggie agrees that racism has no place in sport, and the recent racism at Euro 2012 makes her glad we’re not part of Europe – it’s a stupid continent. But is our national pride any different to those Ukrainian supporters?!

Denzella Kabuki (Veronica) went to Tasmania to look at the use of cricket power as an alternative fuel source. Invented by Prof. Jasper Pong (Francis), he came on the idea of using the limbering up employed by cricketers to generate energy. One cricketer is working the n. They have generated enough power to run the Tamar Valley Power Station toilet hand dryer for a full minute.

Carbon Tax celebrations are about 3 weeks away, and Tony Abbott has been using tortured metaphors such as it being “a python squeeze instead of a cobra strike” but Damien Scranton (Francis) doesn’t think this is zoologically accurate. But he thinks Tony is right on one count (or is that a right …?) – being suffocated by a python would hurt from day one.

During the break was an ad from the Australian Defence Force – “defending our shores via Afghanistan.”

Shaun disagrees with censorship – people shouldn’t even be able to say the word. But the reprint of Mein Kampf has been changed to note Hitler’s errors and point out places where he recycled his ideas – often noted as one of Hitler’s greatest crimes. Shaun thinks that if they want to censor the book to help warn people off becoming National Socialists, then re-releasing the audio book, read by Mel Gibson, might help.

It was time for Top of the Vox Pops – “Should Freedom of Speed extend to other noises?” and opinions varied.

In finance news today, the markets closed down today. Even after all that bailing out.

The economy isn’t riding on the sheep’s back, it’s been driven in a truck owned by Gina Rinehart as Mrs Conroy (Roz) reports from the Mad as Helicopter. We dig up what we “made” earlier, but a slow down in the Chinese economy means we might not be able to sell as much coal, iron and uranium. If the resources boom goes bust, we won’t be able to prop up our manufacturing, which means we’ll rely on China for cheaper goods, boosting our economy again and making it impossible to criticise them for supporting the Assad regime.

Julia Gillard has been explaining her policies to children again, prosumably so they can explain it to their parents. Shaun thinks it is good to talk to children – they are the future – and there’s no point talking to old people.

You certainly can’t argue with the growth figures for last quarter, and Tureen Chip, Senior Economic Forecaster, didn’t see it coming. Was it incompetence? Even Joe Hockey knows that “the numbers are the numbers”.

Nice-One Johnson (Emily) spoke to Organza Quiz (Roz), a spokeperson for Joe Hockey, who finally caved that Hockey was ticked off that even though they are incompetent, the government still manages to pull of numbers like this.

Shaun hates negativity, so decides to be positive. So to talk about the fabulous economic growth figure, he spoke to a member of the inexpert anti-opposition Pinor Rouge, who instead began talking of the garden and “how growth has its season.” He also had a message for Rafael.

In Wisdom of the Elders, Francis spoke to Bill again about the 89th anniversary of Vegimite. It certainly didn’t exist before it was invented, and while Bill worked at the factory at the time, it he was sick the day it was invented. He never liked the “happy little Vegimites song” because of the line “rose in every cheek”  – not sure about  “a sandwich spread that promotes the fact that it will make your bottom flush”. Bill had his own version of the theme song, and played it for Francis.

Before handing off to the talk back, Shaun thinks we should get Rolf Harris, a recent OA recipient, returned to Australia – maybe in exchange for sending back Leo Sayer.

A cursed Tiki causes havoc for Shaun and his family while on a holiday in Hawaii.

Before looking at pornography, Shaun had a show to do – now with 1/4% less interest.

Shaun’s only been a TV journalist for 2 weeks, but he’s yet to become a world-weary, unshockable TV veteran like Liz Hayes, so he didn’t expect the media to turn on itself or another news man that Shaun loves – Julian Assange.

Julian is on his way to Sweden, where unlike the Eurovision trophy, he’s actually wanted. For the last 12 months, he’s been living with Geoffry Roberton and Kathy Lett – Verity Ng thinks that’s a harsh penalty, with the prospect of too many puns, and he should get time off his sentence. But Thorold Munch from the Dept of Foreign Affair he’s getting full consular service – if only he could define what that means.

When the media eats one of its own, it’s only a matter before it disagrees with itself. Francis reported on the media and politics. Rupert Murdoch says he never asked for any back scratching, but it seems there is plenty of finger pointing at each others fingerprints on Murdoch’s back. Francis then interviewed a senior policy advisor (Veronica) for Stephen Conroy, but most of the questions weren’t for her (to answer), they were for others, or maybe Francis himself. Piers Morgan refuses to answers anything.

Rebecca Pollador (Roz) interviewed Anders Krill (Tosh) who photographs the politicians for the House of Representatives website. He tries experiemental shots with models and zebras, but in the end they end up as the traditional rectangular sized head and shoulders shots. An exhibition of his work, in alphabetical order, is on til August.

If Four Corners is the home of investigative journalism, Mad is Hell is the beach house. They recently investigated Captain Emad, a people-smuggler who hid as a refugee – you would think his name would give him away? Emad collects Shopping Trolleys, but also runs a people-smuggling operation from inside Australia – making him the Mad As Hell Small Businessman of the Week.

Shaun will gladly acknowledge when others do a great job, and Sky News covered the seizure and destruction of weapons in a raid, and Shaun was pleased with the metaphor of a violent end to violent weapons. But he loved the detail Sky put into the story, actually demonstrating how guns work. But in the reporters’ demonstration, Mad As Hell footage shows a cameraman was injured – luckily they showed just how dangerous these weapons are. Shaun’s nose smells a Walkley.

John Howard may have tried to “stop the boats” during the Jubilee celebrations, but Shaun misses him – he was steadfast, and without his glasses he looks good – so Shaun removed his too.

In this week’s Back Benched!, Kevin Rudd feels he’s got the rough end of the pineapple. The latest WorkSafe ad shows that safety during the shooting of a WorkSafe ad doesn’t apply to work experience students.

What do people think about other things? They were asked, and the views were varied, to say the least. (“I don’t think the death penalty goes far enough.”)

If a poll was held tomorrow, we would all be surprised, as one hasn’t been called.

Cloris Webbler has predicted the results of every election since 1955 incorrectly, by voting for the other party. She want’s to vote for the worst candidate at the next election, but it’s too close to call at the moment.

What if Greece don’t pay back the 130 billion euro to Germany? Hans-Peter Gruber tells Shaun they might have to declare bankruptcy, and try to administrate their way out of it. Would that mean Germany would occupy Greece, and eventually loot the country of its treasures?

Germany led to Nietzsche, led to the country of supermen, led to Superman, led to Qantas, which led to Pilots. Being a pilot isn’t easy, you can easily mistake Venus for a plane. Desiree Fulton (Emily) follows the story about pilot refresher courses, where the different between planet and plane is explained. Capt. Volks kept second-guessing the voice overs, but you can be certain landing on high-tension power lines is to be avoided, no matter how safe it looks.

The Queen has been it for 60 years, and Gay March talked to Shaun about the Jubilee celebrations. The Reign of Her Majesty was celebrated by rain on Her Majesty, but it didn’t stop the festivities, which were capped off by terrorists exploding Tower Bridge.

The Royal family has released some old home movies, but most of them are Charles being tormented by his mother, who to this day still refuses to abdicate.

As a final point, Shaun noted that the share market has lost so much that if it had been Gina Rhinehart’s personal wealth, she’d be down to her last 6 million. Peter Slipper would write it off with cabcharges.

Shaun gets more than he bargained for when a car he was buying turns out to be an ocean liner. Meanwhile, Roz and Francis are up to their old necks too when a horse they were impersonating has to be put down.

Actually, first Shaun recognised the traditional owners of this timeslot: Mother and Son (1984-1994). This weeks episode was filmed before a live studio audience could leave the chamber. The audience acknowledged they were real.

Shaun felt there was less violence during the Eygipian presidential election than Eurovision. To cover the election, they sent Francis to Chiro not Cairo. Mrs Conroy tells us it’s not easy running a country – so many leaders are in turmoil or have been jailed. Robert Mugabe is an exception, he didn’t even let being voted out of office get in the way of his sense of duty to his country.

The Queen has been running her country twice as long as Robert, and Shaun thinks that her subjects are just as scared. Even Paul McCartney remembers the last time visiting she “touched me with a sword.” He pushed for the ABC to show the Jubilee live, mainly because he doesn’t like Warren Beatty. There were then Vox Pops on the subject of when we should become a republic – “When hell freezes over?”

If you rule a country with too much fear, the UN will come in a monitor you go even further. Kofi Annan doesn’t seem like Syria’s cup of tea. In a report by Charliana Striptank, can Al-Assad’s wife appeal to her husband? Yes, but can she appeal to him to stop the violence?

Time makes some people more cuddly, like Jeff Kennett, who doesn’t think much of prayer rooms at the football. Shaun will defend your right to leave a sporting match to pray, despite the rooms best feature being that they have none.

Schapelle Corby could be out of her Bali hell-hole and back in her Gold Coast one very soon, and Golem Monfries, a free Schapelle advocate says she is stoked. Even if it meant the release of people smugglers, Golem felt smuggling 4kg of drugs was a lot less than 4-5 75kg of people. Shaun recommends you use Google if you want more information.

In Wisdom of the Elders, Francis spoke to William (Bill) Duthie about the anniversary of the Walk for Reconciliation. He felt it was a historic moment, and when he was younger, had no real understanding of Aborginality, but got a bit confused about which famous Aboriginals were which – was it Lionel Rose? The walk was about building bridges using an existing bridge, a great time saver, and involved 300,000 people or 600,000 legs walking as one massed leg. After forgetting what he was talking about, Bill asked Francis to help him mail Captain Cook’s skull back to England via post.

In an upcoming interview with a prostitute, Francis is informed the cost for the hand only, but he wants to know about the whole arm.

In this week’s Miss Fysher’s Murder Mysteries, there was no evidence whatsoever on who was the perpetrator, despite him being caught with the gun over the victim, and continuing to fire it into the body.

Shaun segwayed into Leaning about life through Pop Culture, and in X-Men comics, two men are getting married. Shaun doesn’t like mixed-marriages: a mutant and a non-mutant?!  Which DC character is going to come out? Superman, or the Flash?

Probably not coming up is Shaun debate with representatives of AWU and Mining lobby – Gina Rinehart is a single mother, she needs that $2million an hour.

Inspired by the Neighbours from Hell type story run by Today Tonight or ACA, Sharon Lola Brigita (Roz) covered the story of how Osama Bin Laden remained undiscovered for so long in Pakistan – it was the neighbours, who hadn’t dobbed on him because of his good community engagement – running events, bringing in the bins.

Shaun had a real interview with Rachel Perkins, the director of Mabo. There were comparisons with The Castle, talk of the dance scene, Andrew Bolt’s influence and the involvement of the Mabo family.

There wasn’t time to cover that while $6000 gets you dinner with Tony Abbott, $4.5 gets you dinner without. But Shaun did reflect on Vogue’s decision to not use young or undernourished children – where should they find work now? It’s enough to make you, or them, sick.

What were your favourite moments? Reviews, thoughts?