Senator Steve Fielding’s comments about a so-called loophole in the paid maternity leave scheme has been widely condemned. Sen Fielding said that some women might purposely get themselves pregnant then have an abortion at 20 weeks so they can get paid maternity leave.

Steve Fielding’s comments are wrong on so many levels.

Steve Fielding forgets about women who go through a whole pregnancy and then have to go through a stillbirth. Someone might take months or even years to recover from something like this. Should this person still get maternity leave? Of course they bloody well should.

What about a woman who has a scan at 20 weeks and finds out their baby is hideously deformed and will only live for moments after birth. The kindest thing this woman can do, unless you are a heartless pro-life nutter, is to have an abortion. I personally would want this person to have maternity leave.

Pregnancy is one of the most dangerous undertakings most women are going to go through. It is dangerous for the baby and the mother. Pregnancy is often complicated and there are many reasons why things go wrong. Any legislation of this kind has to come face-to-face with this fact.

Do you know many women who are so evil that they would go through with Steve Fielding’s scheme of defrauding the government? That is incredibly evil- Hitler evil! And to suggest there is a whole horde of evil Hitler women junkies out there just waiting for this legislation is plain ridiculous.

From what I know about junkies it is all about the short term. They need money now, so they can get a hit now. Does a junkie even have the long-term planning to pull something like this off?

Steve Fielding you are an idiot. You have sat back the Family First party years and seriously damaged the pro-life movement. I really hope you never get another Senate term.

The proposal by Queensland Minister Steve Dickson to ban smoking is idiotic in the extreme.

It is a popular and frustrating refrain of intelligent people – those who don’t learn from history are doomed to repeat it. Minister Dickson obviously does not know about the American experience of prohibition.

If you ban something like smoking all you are doing is handing all the revenue over to organised crime. People will still smoke. It will be a serious act of rebellion and become cool again. Not having to pay taxes will make it cheaper too.

A much broader range of people will start to have exposure to organised crime. The same people who sell cigarettes probably sell other drugs as well. With more money to be made there will be more crime.

Banning smoking is a gift to organised crime.

You can think like Minister Dickson and say the government are drug dealers who profit from people’s misery. This is a short sighted and emotional way of looking at it. There is a great deal of fear and emotion mixed up in the so-called war against drugs.

Yes, governments around Australia do receive a hell of a lot of revenue from cigarette taxes. I would much rather governments, legitimate corporations and shopkeepers receive the profits from cigarettes than criminals.

Drug abuse is a very complex problem. Solutions need to be developed using intelligence not emotion. The smoking problem is a balancing act between minimising the number of people taking up smoking, using the taxes raised to help combat the problem and not putting the taxes up so high that it encourages a black market to develop.

Banning smoking does none of these.

Instead of banning smoking they should be considering legalising recreational drugs. Almost all of the points that I have made earlier can be made about recreational drugs.

Wouldn’t you rather people be able to buy marijuana or ecstasy from a legitimate shop run by a legitimate shopkeeper? They would know exactly what they are getting with a greatly reduced chance of poisoning or overdose. The profits could be heavily taxed with a lot more money being put into treatment programs and advertising to discourage drug use.

There would be less people in prison and less crime and probably less people using drugs.

This is not about condoning drug use. It is about taking emotion out of the war against drugs. Solutions require intelligence and logic not a sound bite designed to get your face on the news.

The surgery went fine. The drugs were damn good by the way. I was so relaxed that I fell asleep for the whole surgery. I was only under sedation so they didn’t put me to sleep I actually fell asleep.

I haven’t been feeling too good the last few days. My stomach is still leaks a bit and I’m still getting used to the new tube in my stomach.

Hopefully I’ll get back to blogging and writing very soon.

I will be going in for minor surgery again on May 26. This should only be day surgery and I will not be gone for long I hope.

This should fix my problem and hopefully I will no longer leak.

Wish me luck.

Australian Senator Cory Bernardi has printed on his website (now removed) that the Burqa should be banned “for safety reasons” following its use for an armed robbery.

Following this line of reasoning the balaclava, the motorcycle helmet and the scarf should also be banned.

And for those who read spam e-mail – the South Australian woman wearing a Burqa on her driver’s license does not exist. Senator Bernardi might claim that his proposed ban is for safety reasons, but we all know the real reason.

Senator Bernardi’s comments regarding the Burqa are stupid for many reasons.

1. It is a complete waste of police time and taxpayer money. There are bound to be protests if this is ever introduced and every protest has police on hand in case things get ugly. Police have real criminals to catch.

2. Why should the government have any say over what we can and can’t wear? To use a pathetically political argument this could be the thin end of the wedge. They could start banning boxer shorts and G strings worn above pants – Australians have a right to bad taste.

3. It will be counter-productive. Many Muslims and non-Muslims may start wearing a burqa simply as a form of protest. They say that the banning of a movie is advertising paid for by the government, the same could be true of burqas.

4. How would the ban work? Will they arrest Muslim women for wearing a burqa or fine them? Either way that sounds like persecution to me.

5. Even if you assume that Muslim women are forced to wear the burqa by a patriarchal Muslim culture it still makes no sense. They are told to wear the burqa by a patriarchal culture on one side and told not to wear it by a parliament that consists of 75% men on the other side. It is unfair and patriarchal either way.

6. It makes us a target for terrorism. I’m not saying that fear of terrorism should in any way influence what we do. But why should we stir up the ants nest? If you see a snake do you poke it with a stick? Australia has been lucky with no successful terrorist attacks on Australian soil. Why risk that with a stupid law that is counter-productive and will never be enforced.

7. It is un-Australian. We criticise Iran and Saudi Arabia for forcing women to wear headscarves and now certain members of the Liberal party want to force women not to wear it – is there any real difference?

Of course it is also sexist, racist and anti-religion. Even I aren’t a real fan of the burqa as it is a one-way ticket to vitamin D deficiency, but I will defend anybody’s right to wear it. Except for armed robbers of course.

I recently purchased a Logitech wireless headset. The headset combined with Dragon NaturallySpeaking and the fact that the TV above my bed is now a second monitor means I can write from bed. I used Dragon NaturallySpeaking to write this. Technology don’t you love it?

I have been writing all my blog posts from bed in fact I am writing a lot more generally.

I’ve also recently joined a writing forum, writingforums.org. On this site you have to write the ratio of two reviews for any one piece that you submit. The guys on this site will tell you what is wrong with your piece and how to fix it.

If you are in trouble with your writing you should give the site a visit.

Those two people who tried to sneak the body of their dead 91-year-old grandfather out of England reminded me of something.

You know those vampires who advertise funeral plans on morning TV? They try to play on the heartstrings of sensitive retired people, selling them funeral insurance that they don’t really need. “Imagine if you suddenly died,” they say.

Think of this practically. Why do you need to think of your death? There is absolutely no reason to in everyday life. If you were dead you aren’t going to care what happens to your corpse. Death is a pretty common thing, your family is going to get over it and they will pay for the funeral just like every other family. A funeral is the family’s responsibility not the person who has died. How can you be responsible for something when you are dead?

You would assume that most people with a job and a family would have life insurance. If you have life insurance why the hell would you need funeral insurance? This question is answered in these vampiric adverts, “Oh, I knew Bill’s life insurance wasn’t going to pay out for ages and I had all these bills to pay…” It is obvious to me what is going on here. It is the same companies who do life insurance and funeral insurance. They have contrived things in such a way that life insurance does not pay out for ages meaning that you need funeral insurance as well. This is so obviously a scam and somebody needs to put a stop to it.

Hundreds of years ago there was probably a reason for life insurance taking ages to pay out. But in this day and age information travels instantaneously – there is absolutely no reason in the world, except in circumstances of foul play or criminal misconduct, for life insurance to take so long to pay out.

All this proves one thing: vampires do exist!

I was surprised by Malcolm Turnbull’s decision to leave Parliament by the next election. I know Malcolm Turnbull did a terrible job as Liberal leader, but he was sabotaged by the right wing of his party. I believe if Malcolm had managed to be the leader that he believed he could be without the rest of the party trying to screw him up he would have been able to threaten Rudd at this election.

Just have a look at how the current leader is doing. He says that his asylum seeker policy is based on the question, what would Jesus do? He is riding around the country in his bike shorts and budgie smugglers when he should be doing something constructive. Being a leader is not about indulging your fetish for sweat. I don’t know what the Liberal party room is think thinking. Malcolm may have been a little to the left of John Howard, but surely being in power is more important to them than opposition to gay marriage and closet racism.

There are so many people out there like me who thought Rudd might be good three years ago, but now think he is a stinking little weasel. Not that I want the Liberal party back in power, but I really think the Labour party needs a good scare. I still haven’t forgiven Rudd for his stunt with the solar panel rebate.

I know a lot of people don’t like the Liberal party and would hate to have them back in power, but for the health of our democracy it is important to have two strong power blocs. I know with both major parties going so far to the right there is now a much greater number of people who are willing to vote Green. But I still think that it will be many years before the Green party has enough votes to be a real choice. I also don’t think the Greens have the policy maturity or experience to be in power, much as it grieves me to say this.

With Malcolm out of the way and the Mad Monk in charge the Liberal party is set to be annihilated in this election. In other words we have 10 years of Kevin Rudd and his smarmy smile to look forward to. Part of me wants to die.