The Concatenate

Just a note to let you know that The Concatenate will be taking a two week break over the Christmas / New Year season, as much as to not clutter your unattended email boxes as to serve our own need for a break.

Normal service will be resumed on Monday, 8 January. Subscribers can consider the remaining 50 weeks of the year as a dollar for every week of their subscription. Freeloaders reading the delayed site can usefully use this break to consider life without The Concatenate and whether they wish to subscribe and support it into the future.

Until then have a happy new year.

The legendary fast bowler Glenn McGrath has announced he’ll wisely retire after next year’s one day cricket world cup.

The upshot is that his last test will be the New Year’s Day match in Sydney.

The Electoral Commission has announced its list of parties losing their registration.

Christian Democratic Party (Fred Nile Group)
Citizens Electoral Council of Australia
Citizens Electoral Council of Australia (NSW Division)
Help End Marijuana Prohibition
Hope Party – ethics equality ecology
liberals for forests
New Country Party
No Goods and Services Tax Party
Non-Custodial Parents Party
One Nation Queensland Division
One Nation Western Australia
People Power
Progressive Labour Party
Queensland Greens
Republican Party of Australia
Socialist Alliance
The Australian Shooters Party
The Fishing Party
The Great Australians

These parties can now re-apply for registration.

[M] Activision/Raven
Reviewed on Xbox (also available on PS2, PS3, Wii, Xbox 360, PC and some handhelds)

Ultimate Alliance, the latest Marvel title to make use of the company’s huge stable of super-hero characters, provides a good serve of over the top drama. Improving on earlier (and admirable) attempts at the action-RPG genre and avoiding many of the issues that caused X-Men to be such a disappointment Ultimate Alliance is a pretty good game and a definite buy for Marvel fans.

This time around a coalition of heroes working with the SHIELD organisation must save the world from Dr Doom and his “Masters of Evil”. It’s not the most complex or nuanced plot ever put into a game but it does the job, explaining enough to justify the battles and crisis that occur on Earth-616. A lot of detail has gone into the game world with many issues, regions and characters from Marvel universe incorporated into the story.

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The Minister for Defence, Brendan Nelson, has announced that he’s suspending the issue of light anti-tank weapons within the Army until the end of January.

This despite “current holdings of all weapons and munitions there have also been checked and accounted for”.

But when there’s a media scare running one wouldn’t want to appear complacent.

The Minister for the Environment, Ian Campbell, has announced that he’s turning down an emergency application to give heritage protection to the rock art on the economically sensitive Burrup Peninsula.

“on the basis of evidence presented to me, which includes advice from the Australian Heritage Council, I do not consider that the perceived threat to National Heritage values of the area warrants an emergency heritage listing. According to the Council, while the overall region has National Heritage values, not all sites in the Dampier Archipelago and the Burrup Peninsula have the required values”

The Minister for Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry, Peter McGauran, has announced that he’s going to allow two of the 46 applications for a wheat export licence to go ahead.

“I have today directed the Wheat Export Authority (WEA) to issue a permit for the export of 300,000 tonnes of wheat to Iraq by Wheat Australia and a permit for 500,000 tonnes of wheat to Indonesia by CBH,” Mr McGauran said. I have carefully considered all of the 46 applications received by the WEA. Taking all factors into account, I considered only these two applications to be in the public interest.”

It’s a shame the public interest in having free markets unfettered by ministerial whims was apparently not considered.

AAP, via News, reports that Ajax Fasteners has been bought out of liquidation by Specifix Fasteners which will bring some Christmas cheer to the Ajax workers and customers.

“plans announced yesterday for a total of $5.68 million in redundancy payments to be released to former Ajax staff today would go ahead. As a separate company, Specifix would rehire the staff and any rehired workers would be able to keep their redundancy payments”

The Washington Times has a story on trouble at the Pantex plant in Texas “maintaining the safety, security and reliability of America’s nuclear weapons stockpile”.

It seems nuclear weapons specialists don’t respond well to being made to work 100 hour weeks and in their environment when accidents are made they can be on the spectacular side.

UPI informs us that variants of the name Mohammed now occupy 22nd and 44th on the names for new children charts in the United Kingdom (not accounting for conversions which are also running hot these days one hears).

Before anyone panics, the top of the charts are still reassuringly British:

“Jack remained the most popular boys’ name for the 12th year in a row. On the girls’ side, Olivia moved up three places to the top spot while Jessica, which was No. 1 last year, dropped to third.”

The Seattle Times reports that the next Harry Potter book now has a name: “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows”.

Now you know what you’ll be buying for young relatives next christmas.

Bashir cleared

The SMH appears to have shut down for Christmas already with the leading stories about red light cameras and Christians who go to church but twice a year. Down in world news they are alarmed that the Indonesian Supreme Court has cleared Abu Bakar Bashir of his alleged part in the Bali bombings.

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Wheat heroes

The Age is astounded that a US Army officer, Lieutenant-Colonel Paul Tracey Wright, has written letters to the editors of Australian newspapers defending the disgraced AWB pair Trevor Flugge and Michael Long. That he describes them as public servants when they were employees of AWB suggests they may not have been entirely straight with him.

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Defiant DPP

The Australian has angry words from serious Indigenous leaders after Queensland’s Director of Public Prosecutions, Leanne Clare, announced she was not going to voluntarily submit her rancid Mulrunji decision (in our opinion) to independent review.

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AAP, via News, reports that Colin Zampatti, the nephew of the fashion designer Carla Zampatti, has been charged over Perth’s infamous Ferrari crash.

“Mr Zampatti, 42, has now been charged with driving under the influence, a charge which only applies over a 0.15 blood alcohol level – three times the legal limit”

The car has been valued around $300,000. Boys and their toys…

The management of Harvard Universities $29.2 billion endowment is the stiff of economic legend (which is why they have that much money).

AAP, via Yahoo, informs us that Harvard’s best funds manager this last year was the New Zealand Cantabrian Andy Wiltshire, manager of the timber portfolio.

The endowment returned a stonking 16.7% last year.