Yip, that’s what I’m in the mood for, a dose of whimsy. Something frivolous and fun. Perhaps a little ridiculous. I just got a new fridge (yay!) and with it, fridge poetry. Amazing how words suddenly combine in new ways when they’re split up on a door … Here, then, are a few of my […]
2008
Posted inBusiness, News/Politics
Budget 2008/09: Can the Polokwane Strawman win the war against poverty?
The boisterous rotating arms that signalled a need for substitution, a 60:40 split in the voting for national office-bearers and the fact that leftist formations had backed the winning ticket all signalled that something has changed during the ANC Polokwane’s conference. Whatever has changed has spurred on many private-sector commentators and lobbyists to begin the […]
Posted inLifestyle
Let me count how many ways I love you
Apologies to Elizabeth Barrett Browning for the title line, which I creatively adapted from one of her poems. We have survived another frantic flower-buying, champagne-popping, pink-penguin-attack called Valentine’s Day. The retail industry, every year, lugs huge bags of money to the bank while gleefully chuckling at the foolish consumer who buys into the hype. In […]
Posted inGeneral
Sacred cows on the spit
Sigh. The lot of the writer is a difficult one. The comments on my previous offering have prompted me to write a follow-up post to another piece I wrote about six months ago. For the record, I receive at least three emails from irate readers chastising me for my callous disregard for sensitivity around most […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Why I hope for Hillary
The race to become the Democratic presidential candidate is drawing to a close — with Barack Obama as the current front-runner. Yet, I hope Hillary will be first through the finishing line. It’s not because she, like me, is a woman (although it would be nice to have the most powerful person in the world […]
Posted inLifestyle
I heart street art
When I moved into my flat in Melville a few months ago, the wall of the school situated across the road was a depressing, sludgy grey expanse of concrete with a fence on top of it, punctuated by the occasional messy tag of some egotistical scribbler. Seeing it first thing in the morning was an […]
Posted inNews/Politics
The birth of a country
“We are proud, independent and free. Today ends all delusions that Kosovo will ever be ruled by Belgrade. We are the last bit to symbolise the disintegration of Yugoslavia.” — Declaration of independence by Kosovo Prime Minister Hashim Thaci on February 17 2008 There’s nothing like a new country to inspire writing. Yet another little […]
Posted inNews/Politics
The ANC guide to truncating democracy
What is happening to the ANC? Raw power politics has replaced principle. Where are the women and men of heart and reason to raise their voices within the party now? Too few; too overrun by a new brand of leadership that has tasted state power and wants more of it, unfettered. Maybe this is why […]
Posted inMedia
Fighting Nero in the newsrooms
I am a wimp, but I love being interrogated. Not the fingernail-ripping, electric-mattress kind of interrogation, nor am I into squash balls in the mouth, handcuffs and nurses with whips. I love having my views and opinions dissected, questioned, probed and looked at from different viewpoints. Somehow the process, which is actually quite taxing, helps […]
Posted inNews/Politics
Clinton or Obama? Don’t ignore the Angry White Man!
Clinton or Obama? The media seem to believe that Election ’08 is strictly a two-horse race, with the Republicans given nary a chance. The question that’s being largely ignored, though, is whether the choice lies only between a black man and a white woman. Although I don’t follow American politics too closely — I loathe […]
Posted inGeneral
What about my rights?
I know this one is really going to open a flood of responses, most negative, but I have to ask this question. For the past couple of years, I have seen much reporting on the work of Afri-Forum. According to some news bulletins on mainly SABC2, it is a “rights-based group” doing sterling work on […]
Posted inSport
Proudly South African again!
Just when we need it most, hope has burst on to the South African scene in the form of the sunshine start of the 2008 rugby season. While our politicians are indubitably the scum of the earth, a malignant, avaricious cANCer and the archetypal kakistocracy, and our organs of the state are terminally leprous with […]