One of the reasons I really liked working at the Supreme Court was that it was a bastion of intelligent eccentricity. Many of the judges were unusual people, but they were also intelligent, compassionate people. I know that at least some judges were aware of their eccentricity. One judge (now retired) came in to my [...]
By Legal Eagle
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Posted in Law, Public Policy, Society
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Tagged Department of Justice, depression, eccentricity, eccentrics, fairness, Frank Vincent, health, human resources, job interviews, judges, judiciary, magistrates, mental health, petty tyrants, Rob Hulls, role plays, Supreme Court of Victoria, temperamentally unsuited, Victoria
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Work and pensions minister Chris Grayling is conducting an urgent review into a new medical test for incapacity benefit after fresh figures showed only 6% of those tested were deemed to be totally incapable of working. The figures, covering all new claims from October 2008 to the end of November 2009, show 39% are being [...]
By DeusExMacintosh
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Posted in Britain, Economics, Funnies, Personal, Politics, Popular culture, Society
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Tagged ATOS, Chris Grayling, computer says no, Department for Work and Pensions, disability, DWP, employment support allowance, LiMA, UK coalition government, UK politics, welfare, welfare reform, work capability assessment
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You’ve probably noticed some slowness in the past 2 hours. That’s me, your loving Ozblogistan admin / tyrant, trying to debug a plugin. Apparently asking for debugging information is too much for PHP and MySQL to bear, so they threw an unedifying tantrum which choked the site.
I am not going to link to anyone making ‘dog whistling’ claims this election campaign; there are too many of them. Instead, I am going to make a few requests. 1. Before using this phrase, please take some care to find out what it means. 2. When claiming that this or that politician is ‘dog [...]
By skepticlawyer
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Posted in Economics, Media, Politics
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Tagged ALP, dog whistle, dog whistling, Federal Election 2010, Julia Gillard, LNP, rational voter, statistical vote values, Tony Abbott
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No, I’m not talking about that kind of solicitor, I’m talking about the other kind of solicitor. The one who tells you what the law is. You may think you can shake us off, but the evidence shows we’ve been around for a lo-o-o-ong time, at least 3700 years. Researchers from the Hebrew University of [...]
By Legal Eagle
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Posted in History, Law, Middle east, Religion
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Tagged Akkadian, archaeology, Bava Kamma, Bible, Code of Hammurabi, cuneiform, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, History, Judaism, lawyers, lex talionis, Rabbis, restitution for wrongs, Talmud, Torah, tort, weregild
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I’m back to teaching, which is nice. I like teaching. But there’s one thing I’d forgotten about: the obligatory query as to where my Powerpoint slides can be downloaded from the web. What Powerpoint slides? Long term readers of the blog know that I have problems with Powerpoint from way back. “Powerpoint is against my [...]
By Legal Eagle
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Posted in Academia, Fark!, Popular culture, Technology
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Tagged Academia, Edward Tufte, edward tufte kills a kitten, general grumpiness, mark goetz, pedagogy, Powerpoint, teaching
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We’re not in the habit of handling shout-outs on behalf of third parties, but we happen to think that this one is worthwhile and serious, and it wouldn’t be here if we hadn’t engaged in considerable vetting before hand (one reason why skepticlawyer in particular hasn’t been around much lately, quite apart from my encounter [...]
FRIENDS of an acclaimed Scottish writer have accused the new government’s crackdown on welfare benefits of being a factor in his suicide. Paul Reekie, who, along with Irvine Welsh, was part of a wave of young Scottish authors who rose to international prominence in the 1990s, killed himself in his Edinburgh home last month. The [...]
By DeusExMacintosh
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Posted in Britain, Depression, Economics, Funnies, Politics, scotland, Society
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Tagged George Osborne, housing benefit, incapacity benefit, Paul Reekie, suicide, welfare, welfare reform
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O Rose thou art sick. The invisible worm, That flies in the night In the howling storm: Has found out thy bed Of crimson joy: And his dark secret love Does thy life destroy. (William Blake, The Sick Rose, Songs of Innocence and Experience, 1794) plate here There is a canker eating at the heart [...]
By Legal Eagle
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Posted in General, Politics, Society
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Tagged Australian Labor Party, Australian Liberal Party, Australian politics, belief, fear, Julia Gillard, kevin rudd, opinion polls, politics of fear, reason, the worm, Tony Abbott
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Okay, don’t answer that question. But I didn’t watch either the Debate between our esteemed political leaders, or the Master Chef final. Thus I suspect I am in a minority of the Australian population. I didn’t watch the GillAbb Debate because I am so shizzed off about the direction politics is going in this country [...]
By Legal Eagle
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Posted in Fark!, General, Law, Politics, Popular culture
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Tagged Australian politics, churn, crazy stuff, general grumpiness, Julia Gillard, law firms, lawyers, Master Chef, Tony Abbott
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