The story of the 3 year old kid found dead in outer Melbourne is a tragedy. But there’s something not right in the coverage/ story:

The Herald Sun

When Harpreet Kaur Channa stepped out of the shower and realised her little boy, Gurshan Singh, was no longer in the house, she panicked. But when she discovered that the front door was ajar, her heart raced…

It was around 12.30pm when they lost sight of him.

News.com.au

disappeared from a house in the northern Melbourne suburb of Lalor about 1.10pm. His body was found about 20km away near Melbourne Airport after 7pm.

ABC AM

The boy was inside a house with his mother late yesterday morning at around midday she noticed he was missing, and after searching for him with family for about three quarters of an hour police were called.

The Age

His mother, Harpreet Kaur Channa, called police after he had been missing for 45 minutes, prompting a massive search.

Notice the time line problems.

It could just be confusion in the media.

But that’s not all

The Age

She told police she thought her son had walked out the front door while she was showering.

The Herald Sun

When Harpreet Kaur Channa stepped out of the shower and realised her little boy, Gurshan Singh, was no longer in the house, she panicked. But when she discovered that the front door was ajar, her heart raced.

She knew the three-year-old was able to open the security door.

and yet

ABC

and after searching for him with family for about three quarters of an hour police were called.

Why would you wait 45 minutes to call police if your 3 year old has gone missing? If you knew the 3 year old could get out of the house, why wouldn’t you key lock the door?

But here’s the oddest thing of all

The Age (different article)

Marisa Talarica, 37, whose parents have lived a few doors along the street for 40 years, said the street was busy with cars and people attending a funeral at St Luke’s Catholic Church across the road at lunchtime yesterday.

“At the time he went missing there was a funeral on at the church,” she said.

“The street was full of cars. I don’t know how it’s possible for a kid to go missing when you have so many people around.”

As of this morning, the police are saying no witnesses have come forward, although this will change…because it’s beyond the realms of possibility that a large group of people in the street wouldn’t have noticed a lone 3 year old child walking past. That’s presuming that is what has occurred.

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The Age: Sex story delivers blow to Underbelly

The next series of the hit television show Underbelly may be in doubt after a former King Cross police officer portrayed in the program has threatened to sue for defamation…..

Ms Hatfield’s barrister, Sue Chrysanthou, told the court her client did not know precisely what would be shown in the series but could only assume it would suggest she had a sexual relationship with the Kings Cross identity and nightclub owner John Ibrahim

Yeah, odd that. Given that she admitted under oath to having having spent time with the drug dealer, and that he testified to an affair.

Indeed, if you look back into the archives, the Sydney Morning Herald reported it as fact in 2004

He also had more than his fair share of run-ins with the police. At one stage he was having an affair with a Kings Cross police officer, Wendy Hatfield, who gave another police officer a false name for him when he was pulled over by police for a driving offence

She didn’t sue then, so why now?

Oh, I wonder if it has anything to do with publicity for the series. But no, I’m sure it’s just a coincidence that a former police officer can magically find the money for high priced defamation lawyers

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My worst trait, described by the awesome Kate Carruthers:

I know I’m not alone though, @trib agreed, although he tweets so much I can’t find the shot.

I can’t rule out working for others again, but the chances aren’t great. I’ve never been fired from a job, but I’ve had to walk more than a couple of times.

Everything from stupid pressure on me, to me lecturing them out of place.

I’ve left jobs because I couldn’t stand the stupidity of the ppl I work for.

I hope that doesn’t make me a bad person.

But it might make for a colourful autobiography one day. Well, not that anyone would care to read it, but in my 34 years I’ve been
An admin assistant, Margin Lending Assistant, Nightfiller, Manager, Membership Co-ordinator, 2IC (Insurance), Branch Manager (credit Union), Research/ Electorate Officer and VP/ Founder. And that’s before Proxy Owner, Staff Writer, Editor and Publisher.

You can’t regret it all, even if I do regret most. Oddly enough my favorite job was as Manager for the Junior Soccer Association of WA. I loved that job, and it’s one of the few I left without major issue. Mind you, they slammed me when I left (the President kept asking me to install pirate software, then denied it) but I had no reason to leave other than I thought the next job was better. Turns out it wasn’t. Indeed, working at the WACA was one of the worst mistakes of my life.

Hi Darren Beazley, I’ll never forget

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So you’re stuck in the middle of whoop whoop. Literally. You might be stuck for the night, under dressed, surrounded by scrub and god knows what else. So what do you ask for?

via The Age

As the light was fading, the chopper pilot wouldn’t be able to land but could drop some supplies.

“Beer, water, food and rugs. Especially beer,” quipped the Opposition Leader.

You just can’t imagine Rudd saying anything close.

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Just a short admin note for The Inquisitr: we’ve recently terminated one of our syndication deals. I won’t go into the details, however I wish the company involved future success, and although the product wasn’t working for us, I still like what this company does as a competitor to AP, so I’ll still be cheering a bit for them.

What that means is that in the last 2 weeks we’ve had a significant drop in posts on The Inquisitr. Roughly 7-10 posts a day. It means we’re not covering as much general news stuff as we were.

I’m not sure quite yet as to whether this is a good or bad thing. It’s less to read, but likewise it may also help our original content stand out some more.

It does mean though that we are short in some categories, particularly science and health (and we had to delete the old content from them as well per the termination of the deal.) I haven’t made the call yet, but we might fold science and health into a sub-tech category going forward vs remaining stand-alone.

Not ready to hire or expand again until we get out of the first quarter ad slump (there always seems to be one this time of year), so we’ll wait until at least mid April to review.

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Imagine leaving your long term marriage to be with the husband of the woman you tried to donate your eggs to.

Would make for an interesting Mills and Boon story.

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Where do Fairfax find these people?

The Age: W-class shake and rattle should be rolled into retirement

It’s quite possible that any resident of San Francisco, Vienna or even Bendigo – all of which have trams – might have seen photographs of the flying W-class at the Commonwealth Games and thought Melburnians a tad backward.

October last year

Second Melbourne tram joins San Francisco’s historic streetcar fleet

One of Melbourne’s iconic W-Class trams was presented to San Francisco as a gift to run on the city’s heritage streetcar service.

Yes, they think us so backward they ask for more W class trams.

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The Age: Airport road won’t cope with demand, study shows

In its brief to IMIS, the Department of Transport specified it must measure the likely popularity of the train line based on a $16 one-way fare (the cost of the existing SkyBus).

It found few people who now drive to the airport would be convinced to use the rail line, and it would instead take passengers off existing bus services and taxis.

It also found an airport rail link would ruin the taxi industry, which relies on 7000 trips a day to the airport.

Wrong. So very wrong.

Sure, it would kill the Sky Bus, but it wouldn’t ruin the taxi industry. When was the last time anyone could say they visited an airport with a rail link and not found a busy cab rank. I haven’t been into Brisbane that often but always see cabs. Have been to Sydney fairly regularly, and I always have to queue for cabs, even though there’s a perfectly good rail line that connects into the city.

The misunderstanding is one of taxi use: people catch a cab now because it’s quicker and drops you to your door.

The Sky Bus on the other hand gets caught in traffic and is piss poor.

If you had an express train to the city from the airport, you’d actually have more users than the Sky Bus.

Would some switch from cabs: yes. But likewise it may also force Melbourne cabs to reduce charges to the airport as well, which in my experience traveling are some of the worst in the world price wise.

To get from Mont Albert to the airport costs me a staggering $90 in a cab…to travel 38kms. If I could get on a train that takes 10 mins into town, and a 25 minute trip out, hell I’d consider using it…because in traffic and thanks to a piss poor situation at the end of the Eastern Freeway, it takes just as long, if not longer in a cab, unless it’s early morning or late night.

I’m not anti-freeway or anti-car by any means: connect the Eastern to Citylink tomorrow I say, but likewise if Melbourne believes it’s a serious city in a global sense, it would also build a line to the airport.

PS: and it should connect to the Doncaster line, which should ALSO be built ASAP.

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Via The Age

Rudd also defended the government’s proposed internet filter, which is designed to block child pornography, terrorist material and other extreme and offensive information, saying it was in line with how movies and videos were censored.

Except it’s not, is it Kevin Rudd, because you can view/ buy R and X rated movies. Under the filter, games suitable for adults are completely banned.

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