Sideswipe

Trinkets sell but the cancer message falls on deaf ears: One of the girls pictured smoking in Albert Park in Friday's Herald as part of a story about the push for smoke-free parks appears to be wearing the pink breast cancer awareness rubber wrist band.

There must have been an infiltrator. Perhaps it was an aggrieved police officer. Whoever it was should have been shot. In fact, they probably have been. The offender? Whoever it was that played the Straitjacket Fits song "She Speeds" as the Labour Party campaign launch swung into gear at the Auckland Town Hall yesterday. It was, of course, the only reference, albeit oblique, to "it" at the gathering. But around a few corners at the Sky City Convention Centre, where National was holding its campaign launch, the motorcade case was topic du jour. MC Jim Hopkins had first crack. He had been advised that the PM herself would make an appearance at the National launch, just before leader Don Brash spoke in about half an hour, he said. "The good news is that her motorcade has just passed through Rotorua."

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In a move commonly known as career suicide Mikey Havoc has teamed up with the guy who wanted to film the birth of a baby for a porno, to bring you a new magazine called Uncensored. Yes, Steve Crow is publishing a low-rent version of Investigate magazine, to be launched with heavy symbolism on September 11. As a contributing editor Havoc has written a rant suggesting the Jacko trial was a deliberate move to distract the world from the Iraq war. Somehow he sees lies everywhere, but has complete faith in Jacko's innocence. However, the truly excruciating parts of his rambling opinion piece are when he goes all evangelical. "I can only imagine how much time I would have had for thinking about other things in my life, if I had never had to worry about what stupid selfish thing George Bush was up to each day. Unfortunately I cannot do that because I happen to have developed a great zest for life and living. I care about the preservation of our species and the planet we live on".

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Ill thought out Art

1: The Thames Water company succeeded in pressuring artist Mark McGowan to abandon his art project protesting at society's reckless use of water. McGowan turned on the House Gallery's tap and planned not to turn it off for a year (wasting an estimated 17.7 million litres).

Ill thought out Art

2: And in Chicago, days after photographer Kerry Skarbakka announced his "Falling" project, he was pressured into abandoning it. Skarbakka said he was awed by the sight of people falling or jumping from the World Trade Centre on September 11 and said he would, in tribute, repeatedly plunge four storeys from Chicago's Museum of Contemporary Art (but was quickly excoriated for poor taste). (Source: News of the Weird)