Southwell's Word Emporium

  When Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin went to the great commune in the sky to begin his Infinity-Year Plan of Production Quotas, Sydney's  Daily Telegraph announced the news in an appropriately respectful and sober manner.  “Stalin Dead – Hooray” read the paper's newsstand posters. Then owner Frank Packer, Kerry’s dad, insisted on adding the "hooray" much to the displeasure of the print unions, who refused to put the poster out.  I think it eventually did get distributed and displayed but can't find an image to confirm that. Despite such relatively recent shenanigans it's not to hard to find people bemoaning the appalling decline in  journalistic standards . However, not all ol’-timey newspapers, even the "reputable ones", were reliable bastions of fairness, accuracy, integrity and impartiality. For much of its run the New York Sun was considered a serious broadsheet, roughly on a par with the “Grey Lady” New York Times , but in its early days...

It took a while for me to realise Victoria was not a normal state. Before Covid I thought the Andrews government was like any other Labor one, a big spender whose profligacy would eventually have to be corrected. I even bought some of the relentless propaganda that Dan Andrews was a can-do premier. Then came the first Covid hotel quarantine debacle. I expected Andrews and other ministers would be forced to resign – isn’t that what happens when a clearly dysfunctional government  fails to contain an outbreak that causes 800 deaths and leads to a four-and-a-half-month crushing lockdown? In Victoria the answer is no. Yes, the health minister angrily resigned when Andrews dumped her in it before the inquiry. However, she accepted no responsibility and basically accused the premier, a former factional colleague,  of being a liar . And no one much seemed to think this was out of the usual. I began realising the normal rules of accountability just don’t apply in Victor...

Nearly everybody has a Covid opinion and can cite their favourite experts in support , so it seems strange that one unimpeachable authority on human behaviour has been so little referenced. Who else could I mean but Mr Kenny Rogers ? Some younger readers might not be too familiar with Rogers, who sadly has gone to that straight-whisky saloon in the sky, but he sang both kinds of music - country AND western  - plus a Bee Gees song or two with friends . In his magnificent treatise on applied psychology, The Gambler , Rogers gave us these astute observations: "You’ve gotta know when to hold ‘em Know when to fold ‘em Know when to walk away And know when to run" That tells gamblers to keep a cool head and never “double down” on losses. This advice is often expressed in other ways, such as "not throwing good money after bad”. That these warnings aren't always heeded is why casinos operate in big swanky buildings and offer cheap or even free entertainment, food, drinks, ac...

If you follow Anthony Albanese on Twitter, which I masochistically do, you will know he grew up an only child in a single-parent household with his mother on welfare. It’s tragic story that stoically can only be drawn out him once or twice a day .  On the "Meet Anthony" and "Anthony's Story" sections of his website it's more a case of first meet his mum and hear her story. As a boy, Albanese he never knew his father, who his mother said had died in a car crash. Dad remained stubbornly dead until Albanese was about 14, when his mother let him know his father was a safer driver than previously reported . Albanese’s impoverished mother met the man who would give her a son while on a cruise ship to take a European vacation. He was still very much alive until 2014 and living in Italy, where Albanese Jr eventually met him and discovered two half-siblings. Another thing you learn following Albanese on Twitter is that he wants pretty well everything – from toothpi...