Peter McGinley

ONE in 10 patients in Victorian hospitals experience medical mistakes and mishaps, some serious, a new report shows.

The auditor-general’s report, tabled in State Parliament today, estimates “clinical incidents” affected about 135,000 patients last year, but the exact number is not known because not all incidents are reported.

Our hospital system is in dire straits and the Brumby government is doing NOTHING about it! This is a further example of the poor record of Labor in our state and why they are unfit to be our government. Bring on November 2010 and bring on a Liberal-led coalition government which will do a much better job at running our state.

Sourced from Boing Boing. Excuse the British prices.

Really opens your eyes that to the fact that mobile phone companies are making a huge profit and ripping us off in the process. It’ll make me think twice before sending that text next time.

You know how the mobile carriers charge you a couple cents to SMS a few characters’ worth of text over their network? When you add it up, you’re paying about a zillion bucks a meg for that traffic — seriously! A space scientist from Leicester has calculated that SMS data is four times more expensive than receiving data from the Hubble space telescope.

He worked out the cost of obtaining a megabyte of data from Hubble – and compared that with the 5p cost of sending a text. He said: “The bottom line is texting is at least 4 times more expensive than transmitting data from Hubble, and is likely to be substantially more than that.

“The maximum size for a text message is 160 characters, which takes 140 bytes because there are only 7 bits per character in the text messaging system, and we assume the average price for a text message is 5p. There are 1,048,576 bytes in a megabyte, so that’s 1 million/140 = 7490 text messages to transmit one megabyte. At 5p each, that’s £374.49 per MB - or about 4.4 times more expensive than the ‘most pessimistic’ estimate for Hubble Space Telescope transmission costs.”

Dr Bannister said it had been difficult to work out exactly how much Hubble data transmission costs. So he contacted NASA who gave him a firm figure of £8.85 per megabyte (MB) for the transmission of data from HST to the Earth.

The so-called “razor gang” of Kevin Rudd’s “government” have struck again with another attack on the poor and vulnerable of our society. Last week they had carers and pensioners in their sights but now have a charity, the Bonnie Babes Foundation, which provides much needed and invaluable support to couples who have suffered from the traumatic experience of losing a baby through miscarriage in their firing line.

The previous Howard coalition government promised $800,000 to the foundation to setup and operate a vital telephone counselling service. This cut comes after Rudd’s reckless spending of tax payer dollars to save the “Tree of Knowledge”, a tree in Barcaldine, Queensland, under which the Australian Labor Party was formed 117 years ago, amongst other things. He also spent valuable tax-payer money on a 50-page booklet on the “achievements” of his “government” in its first 100 day in office and on various overseas junkets to Papua New Guinea, East Timor, Iraq, Afghanistan and the Solomon Islands.

Rudd’s cuts demonstrate a number of disturbing factors about him and the way his “government” is operating. We have a “government” which was swept to power late last year under the guise of being all for the “working family”. Now in power the complete incompetence of the ALP is in full showing and it is a government not living up to its election promises. Kevin Rudd does not seem to realise that a couple who has suffered from the traumatic experience of losing a baby is often the core of a working family. This cut demonstrates that Rudd and his “government” are not truly “for” the working family but are rather a bunch of 2nd graders who now have the football in their yard and have no idea what to do with it.

One cannot argue that fat can be trimmed to make for a tighter budget in May. Removing money from organisations and people who either desperately need it or whole-heartedly deserve it, however, is not the way to go about it. Perhaps the Prime Minister should start closer to home in his own department by cutting the amount of tax-payer money he is wasting on junkets and pointless propaganda booklets containing nothing but biased garbage on the so-called achievements of a “government” which is frighteningly incompetent.

Another day and another shooting in the privately armed United States, this time at a shopping centre in Omaha in the state of Nebraska. 8 people have been senselessly murdered by clearly a disturbed individual who turned his weapon, an SKS Carbine on himself.

Nobody can deny that this is simply a grave tragedy. One major message that should have been derived from these events sadly many times before and should be even more re-enforced is the senselessness of the 2nd Amendment and its need to be revoked. For those who are unaware, the 2nd Amendment states:

“A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

It is extremely stupid that American society is given the right to possess arms, particularly in light of their easy attainment and the precedent set for their use in such grave and senseless mass murders by mentally disturbed individuals. Columbine, Virginia Tech, and now Westroads, do I need to go on listing these acts of pure evil and violence?

How many more people must die before some bright spark on Capitol Hill has the wisdom to set the wheels in motion to go about a change to prevent the pain caused by these events happening to other families? How many more must hurt at the hands of somebody who is clearly in desperate need of help?

Just letting everybody know, if you have e-mailed me before October 1st, your e-mail has been lost due to an error with my inbox. Please re-email me and I will respond as soon as possible.

Collingwood has lost to Geelong at the 1st Perliminary Final tonight at the MCG. With a crowd of 98,002 in attendance, it was the biggest crowd this season with simply unprecedented demand for tickets. Both teams played well but Collinwood secummbed to Geelong by 5 points. Collingwood was trailing only by a few points at each quarter but in the last quarter seemingly lost track and fell asleep, losing possession of the ball and missing oppourtunities inside 50.

Next week, Geelong will play the winner of the 2nd Perliminary Final, either Port Adelaide or the Kangaroos for the 2007 Premiership at the MCG. My tip, it will be Geelong V. Port Adealide, with Geelong winning by 10 points.

Just came back from the Kangaroos V Hawthorn game at the ‘G. I must say, I have never seen a more dreaful AFL game in all my life. Not only did Hawthorn lose, but there were a COUNTLESS number of missed oppourtunites , for BOTH sides. It was like watching Rugby mixed with NFL.

Oh well, bring on Collinwood V Geelong next Friday.

Oh and a little note to the Kangaroos: you are going DOWN next week. You won’t know what hit you when you play Port.

Italian opera legend Luciano Pavarotti’s battle with pancreatic cancer has ended, with his passing away at home in Modena, Italy at about 5am local time (UTC/GMT +2) today. Pavarotti was a tenor and one of the greatest opera singers of our time. His remarkable voice gripped audiences around the world and he received a standing ovation after every show.

His management released a short statement which said, “”The Maestro fought a long, tough battle against the pancreatic cancer which eventually took his life. In fitting with the approach that characterised his life and work, he remained positive until finally succumbing to the last stages of his illness.”

He will be sorely missed by all and may he Rest In Peace.