The fascists are still trying to gas us

Recently a shocking crime was unmasked. Billions of dollars were stolen and thousands of people were killed.

I'm talking about the VW Emissions Scandal aka Dieselgate. "Oh that," you say, clicking on another link, "I thought you were going to talk about something important". Which makes you part of the problem.

Champions of the Big Lie, then and now

[Yes, this is an egregious Godwin, and moreover unfairly associates a great car with a couple of utter scumbags, but I think it's worth pointing out the history of this evil corporation.]

This is not merely a case of a company concealing facts to cover for some embarrassing or expensive stuff-up, but systematically engineering a system to break the law. How is this any less criminal than planning and then committing a straight-out robbery?

Then there are the deaths.

Clearly, any estimates of mortality in a case like this are only going to be very rough, but consider this: Many European countries have failed to meet targets for reducing NO_x pollution. In the UK alone, 23,500 premature deaths per year are estimated to be caused by NO_x pollution. Transport accounts for nearly half of all NO_x emissions. The hacked VWs were putting out up to 35 times the legal limits of NO_x. VW is Europe's largest car manufacturer, and this scandal has been ongoing for many years.

You do the maths: Whatever way you calculate it, there are thousands of deaths attributable to this hack. And that's not counting illnesses and environmental damage.

Why does no one seem to be upset about this? It's barely being reported on-line, and when it is, it attracts comments like:

"Meh, they all do it"

"I don't care, I didn't buy my car based on the NO_x emissions"

"This is the result of environmental agencies being too strict"

"I still trust VW to give me adequate compensation"

and even

"I admire their skill in pulling something like this off"

[These are paraphrased, but genuinely reflect comments I've read.]

Business Insider tells us why they think this scandal is "so annoying": apparently entirely because it will cause VW to lose market share in the US!

Not one word suggesting it's a bad thing to deliberately and cynically break the law, to steal billions of dollars, and knowingly kill people in the process. Presumably these things are just par for the course in Big Business.

Yet imagine if a criminal had committed a bank heist, and cold-bloodedly gunned down some bystanders in the process (that is to say stole 1000 times less money and caused 1000 times fewer fatalities) or, worse still, was a welfare recipient who had ripped off a few thousand; those same commentators would screech like their balls were caught in a rabbit trap and they'd demand that the perpetrator be hung, flogged, and then hung again.

Let us get angry at this. Let us demand that the board of this evil corporation have their heads put on pikes as a warning to others.

Silly scissors

One of the fun aspects of purchasing Chinese stuff on eBay is reading the instruction/warning labels.

Does this mean it's OK to stick them into adults?

Here is the label in its full glory:

Have a laugh, but don't look down on the writer. It's perfectly comprehensible and, if you can get past the poor (but forgivable) word choices, quite a reasonable warning label.

Contrast this to the idiotic warnings and deliberately obfuscated legalese to be found on products made by people whose first (and probably only) language is English.

Be Kind to Bots

Spare a thought for the automatic checkout machine who lives in a supermarket.

I have heard people swearing and cursing at them (and I've done it myself in the past), sneering at them, calling them stupid and so on, but I've never once heard anyone being polite to them. Anyone who returns the machine's "Thank you" always does so sarcastically.

Think for a moment about what this means.

It's considered acceptable, and even mildly amusing, to heap humiliating insults on a machine, but if you try to do the opposite, people will look at you like you're crazy and maybe say something like "You do know that it can't hear you, don't you?" in a pitying tone.

I find it somewhat worrying that only politeness and not abuse is considered to be irrational, and it's even more concerning when you realise that this is how people would have behaved towards slaves.

Imagine you had a servant, and they didn't understand what you said (through being deaf, or not speaking English, or whatever), would you consider it acceptable to abuse and insult them [assuming you could do so without giving your feelings away by body language]? If not, then why should it be acceptable to swear at a machine - which is literally acting as your servant - just because it can't hear you?

The machine might not be able to hear, but your actions say something about you.

Soylent Green is Pancakes!

Soylent Green is Pancakes!

Recently I was given some Soylent to try out. Soylent is a powder that that contains all of the nutrients required to sustain life. You mix it with water and drink it. In principle at least, you could live off the stuff indefinitely. And, yes, the name is an ironic reference to the fictional Soylent Green.

At first sight, it might seem to be a solution looking for a problem. Why would you want to eliminate the pleasure of eating food from your life? Isn't that like using artificial insemination so that you don't have to have sex?

It seems to be advertised on the basis that it's quick and easy to prepare, yet cheaper and healthier than takeaway. The idea is presumably that the archetypal computer geek, assailed with hunger but unwilling to relinquish the joy of debugging the latest Linux kernel to prepare dinner, slugs down a glass of Soylent, rather than ordering in a pizza and coke.

But it has more potential than just a convenience food for the time-poor.

Given that it's light in weight, will keep a long time without refrigeration and can be prepared without any special equipment, it might be useful on expeditions or in remote communities with limited access to fresh food. It would be a good thing to pack away as an emergency ration. It would surely have a place in disaster relief. Also, it might be helpful for those with eating disorders where "normal" food would trigger binging.

It's not going to find a place on everyone's table, but it's potentially a useful product.

An Aussie version of Solylent

The product I tried was not the original American formula, but an Australian version.   The Australian version comes in two varieties; "Chocolate" and "Premium". These differ from each other (and both differ from the American version) in contents and nutritional breakdown. All are formulated for a 2,000 calorie daily diet (obviously you can vary this by eating proportionally more or less). Puzzlingly, the American version has a significant excess proportion of fat and a deficit of fibre. The Aussie versions come much closer to the recommended proportions.

Here is the comparison (the quantities are for a day's worth of servings):

	US Version		AU Version (Chocolate)		AU Version (Premium)
Fat	96 g	43%	52 g	23%	67 g	31%
Protein	84 g	17%	121 g	24%	101 g	21%
Carbohydrate	204 g	40%	261 g	53%	235 g	48%
Fibre	16 g		30 g		48 g

[% refers percentage contribution to total calories]

Mmmm, Soylent!

Here's what the stuff looks like in person. This is the chocolate flavoured version. The colour isn't totally accurate - it's a fraction more brown than shown - but it's much closer than the example on the aussielent web site, which looks like a photo of pure cocoa powder.

I made half of it up as per directions.

Soylent; like a chocolate milkshake, only crunchy floury

The flavour was neutral and not unpleasant. After drinking, I felt full; as if I'd had a normal meal. I had thought that it might make me feel starved afterwards, but it seems my body registered the calories and responded appropriately.

The only problem - and this is a significant problem which will need to be addressed if the stuff is going to achieve any sort of public acceptance - is the texture. It's horribly floury; to the extent that it's unpleasant to drink, despite the otherwise acceptable flavour.

It has been suggested that the texture can be improved by letting it stand for a while. Some say it's better at room temperature, and others prefer it chilled. I tried it after standing for a considerable period at room temperature and then in the fridge overnight. I also mixed it thoroughly in a blender. Nothing seemed to make any difference to the texture.

It tasted to me like diluted cake mix or pancake batter.

Pancake batter? Now that's an idea!

If life gives you pancake batter...

As an experiment, I mixed some of the remaining Soylent with water and made pancakes. Since I only used water, and not the usual eggs and milk, the Soylent pancakes would be nutritionally the same as the original Solyent - with the exception of a little extra fat from the butter used to grease the pan, and possibly minus a small amount of the vitamins due to the cooking process.

The darker colour of the batter meant that the lacy patterns from cooking weren't as noticeable, and also they were a little more brittle (presumably due to the lack of eggs) and had to be turned with care, but otherwise they came out the same as normal pancakes.

Eaten alone, without any toppings, Soylent pancakes are virtually the same as ordinary pancakes but somewhat more flavourful. That is to say, they taste really good. Unlike the original drink, they are something that can be consumed with pleasure.

Needless to say, the remainder of the Soylent was used for pancakes. The picture at the top of this entry is an example. Obviously this goes against the philosophy behind Soylent, but if you're of an experimental frame of mind, I'd recommend giving it a try. As currently formulated, this seems to be the best way to use the stuff.

And here's an idea for some entrepreneur; sell Soylent in the form of pancake-like wafers. You could call it Lembas (which has much more pleasant associations than the loathsome Soylent Green), and cash in on the popularity of the Lord of the Rings

Return of the Rainbow Flag

Last Valentine's Day I made a post which featured a rainbow flag made from synthetic caviar. Now is probably a good time to post an explanation of how it was done.

Synthetic Caviar

Technical Background

Synthetic caviar is produced by a process known as Spherification. This technique relies on an unusual property of the substance sodium alginate.

Before I go any further, sodium alginate is not a weird and sinister chemical synthesised in the laboratory of some evil food corporation, but a substance extracted from seaweed. You could think of it as a vegetarian version of gelatin. You will have eaten it many times before; amongst other things, it's used to create the "cherries" in fruit buns and the fillings in stuffed olives.

Sodium alginate has the same effect as gelatin (i.e. converts a liquid into a gel), but it achieves this by a different mechanism, and this mechanism can be exploited to create unusual food items.

When a small quantity of sodium alginate is dissolved* in water, it gives the resulting solution a syrupy texture. This solution is stable, and unlike gelatin, doesn't set when it becomes cold (although it will become noticeably more viscous). Sodium alginate is often used as a thickening agent in foods for this reason.

[* = technically, it doesn't actually dissolve but in fact disperses; the difference is academic from the point of view of cooking.]

Where the interesting part comes in is that when sodium alginate comes into contact with a liquid containing calcium, it converts to calcium alginate, which forms a firm gel. Once formed, this gel is stable, moderately tough and unaffected by temperature.

So what you can do is add sodium alginate to an appropriate liquid, drip blobs of it into a bath containing calcium solution, and then fish them out once the outside has firmed up. You end up with a sphere that's firm on the outside, but with a liquid centre.

You can also do Reverse Spherification where you drip a calcium-rich substance into a sodium alginate bath.

With the right ingredients, you can make not only synthetic caviar, but also a wide variety of other unusual foods.

Plusses

• Looks really cool.
• Not difficult to do. The process can be performed by a school child.
• It is unusual enough that it can be a science fair project, or can be an impressive party trick. The spheres are unaffected by alcohol, so you can make all sorts of weird cocktails with them. Try dressing up as a mad scientist and serve them up in test tubes, beakers, etc.
• Ingredients aren't overly expensive.You only need tiny quantities anyway.
• The main ingredient is extracted from seaweed and is environmentally sustainable, acceptable to vegans, Halal and Kosher. So (assuming you choose your other ingredients wisely) you're safe from offending pretty much anyone.

Minuses

• Can be time-consuming to make more than a relatively small quantity (you can buy special tools to make them in bulk, but these are fairly expensive).
• Must be used soon after preparation. The texture starts to deteriorate after a few hours (depending on the ingredients, the spheres either start weeping or harden up right through). You can make up the alginate solution the night before, but not the spheres.
• Ingredients aren't readily available at your local grocery store (although can be ordered on line fairly easily). 

The Rainbow Flag of caviar [click for larger image]

The Recipe

If you think you might want to give it a go, a good starting point would be to download the Texture - A hydrocolloid recipe collection, by Martin Lersh from the Khymnos blog.

Don't be intimidated by the size and technical detail. Go to the "Sodium alginate" section and look over some of the recipes for caviar.

For a pictorial description of the process (with some incredible photography) check out the Luxirare blog. Don't let the professionalism of this site put you off, either; you can achieve amazing effects without any special technical skills or equipment. It's really easy, in fact.

The synthetic caviar featured on this blog was made as follows:

1) Firstly, a 1% solution of sodium alginate was made (1 g of sodium alginate in 100 ml of hot water).

This is actually the most difficult part of the whole process. Sodium alginate doesn't dissolve in the sense that sugar or salt does, but it basically absorbs water and swells up into a lumpy mass of jelly, with hard bits in it. Left by itself this mass will keep absorbing water and most likely will eventually attain an even consistency, however this would take a very long time and you need to give it some help.

Some people use a blender to dissolve the sodium alginate. This is easy to do and works very quickly, but beats an enormous amount of air into the mixture, which means it has to be left for several hours for the air bubbles to clear.

I used very hot water (just off boiling), and slowly added it to the alginate, mixing by hand all of the time. A flat tool like an ice-cream stick or the blade of a butter knife works best for mixing for mixing; with a fork, lumps get stuck between the tines.

After about 10 minutes of mixing, the mass was nearly all broken up with a few harder lumps floating around. When left to sit for half an hour, the lumps had dissolved and all of the air bubbles had cleared. I'm not sure whether the hand mixing put in fewer air bubbles, or whether the hot water made them clear faster.

BTW, This solution is stable and can be kept in the fridge for at least a few days.

2) The solution was then portioned out into a number of small glasses, one for each colour and appropriate colourings and flavourings (rose water, grape juice etc.) were added. The original alginate solution was made more concentrated than was required in order to allow 50% or so extra liquid in the form of flavourings to be added.

You will have to experiment with what works best for you here. I found that simple food colours and essences were easiest to deal with, and they would be recommended as a starting point. I found that very acidic (lemon juice) or sticky (mango nectar) liquids were hard to deal with. I tried to use sodium citrate to reduce the acidity of the lemon juice, but it didn't help much and simply added a salty flavour.

3) 2 g of calcium chloride was then dissolved in 200 ml of warm water in a glass.

Calcium chloride can impart a (very slightly) salty taste. This is not generally noticeable, but may be an issue when using very subtle flavourings. In this case, you can substitute calcium lactate.

4) The spheres were created by dripping the appropriate solution into the calcium chloride solution with a 10 ml syringe. Approx 5 ml of solution was used at a time, after which the spheres were retrieved from the solution with a sieve, rinsed in water and set aside. The spheres only need to sit a short time in the solution (say 30 seconds) to firm up.

The Ingredients

The Main Ingredients

In Australia, you can get the ingredients from Gourmet Goldmine and The Red Spoon ^co.

It's best to get the smallest size packs, which are around 80 g. An evening's experimenting might only require around 2 g, so even 80 g will go a long way.

You'll also need scales capable of measuring down to about 0.1 g and a 10 ml syringe. You can get the syringe on line or from a chemist. Don't be scared; it is not illegal to buy syringes in Australia.

In Defence of Tony Abbott

This Australia Day, what could be more patriotic than coming out in defence of our glorious prime minister Tony Abbott, captain of Tame Team Australia?

Tony Abbott is a national embarrassment and the worst prime minister, by a long margin, I have had to endure in my entire life. Almost certainly he is Australia's worst prime minister ever.

I've heard it said that he combines the intelligence of George W Bush with the compassion of Margaret Thatcher. I suppose this statement was intended as an insult, but it's actually flattery since he is inferior to both of his role models in these respects.

He is a pathological liar. He is sufficiently bereft of empathy that I suggest he would meet the clinical definition of a psychopath. He doesn't think things through, believing he can make things up on the spot, yet he can't think on his feet either. He is cowardly and violent; an archetypal bully. He is spiteful. He panics easily. He is not suited to wielding any sort of power.

The media banged on and on about Julia Gillard's "lie" (which amounted to a tedious hair-splitting argument about whether an Emissions Trading Scheme counted as a Tax or not). They don't do this about Abbott. This is partly down to media bias, but also because Abbott has told so many lies it's difficult to know where to even begin. If you try to highlight just a few lies, you end up ignoring, and by implication accepting, scores of other equally bad examples of dishonesty. People have had to resort to listing his lies and the lists run into the hundreds. Check out Tracking Abbotts Wreckage; you will notice that the page is very slow to load, presumably because of its length.

His beliefs, in so far as you can tell what they are through the screen of lies and contradictions, are a mixture of the bizarre and frightening. When someone considers it an important reform to bring back knighthoods, or spend $250m putting chaplains in state schools, you really have to wonder what century they think they're living in.

For a while I was wondering whether there was more to his actions than met the eye; that beneath a veneer of jaw-dropping incompetence there was some deep and cunning scheme afoot. After all, it's not a trivial task to become Prime Minister. You surely have to a reasonably high level of brain power to be able to plot and scheme your way right to the top.

For instance, putting refugees in (what amounts to) death camps is totally evil and the sort of thing that should have those responsible up before an international tribunal, charged with crimes against humanity. Even if you had no morals, it's still undesirable in that it's an extremely expensive and inefficient option, which also breaches international law and therefore weakens your hand internationally.

Yet there are logical reasons why an intelligent (if totally unscrupulous) person might still go down this path. It's Fascism 101; if you demonise a group, you can blame them for any of society's problems, and you can appear strong - even heroic - by taking tough action against them. The benefits in this regard might well outweigh the costs.

Similarly, smashing up a government enterprise or destroying an industry might also be a rational decision if your mates can loot the wreckage.

However, the damage being done is too wide-spread for that, and the only possible scheme that seems compatible with his actions is if he were an anarchist/libertarian (or possibly even an agent of some rival power), who is selflessly sacrificing his image to destroy the state apparatus, bring the country to its knees, and tarnish forever the office of prime minister. But this doesn't seem likely; especially the self-sacrificing part.

So when am I going to get on with defending him?

Actually, I did a Tony Abbott here; that is to say, I lied. At least, I'm not going to try to find some creditable aspect of his personality that has hitherto been overlooked, and claim that as a consequence we should think less badly of him. While he may indeed have some positive characteristics (although discovering them would be like panning for gold in a sewage pond in the middle of summer), I am going to make a different point:

By concentrating on how loathsome Tony Abbott is, we run the serious risk of underestimating how bad the rest of his government is.

The destructive and idiotic policies he is trying to implement are in the main part Coalition policies. Abbott is obviously just a tool; a puppet, elevated to his current position by external forces. While some of his most idiotic ideas seem to be of his own making, he is in general following a script laid down by others.

And in this respect, he is typical of the current cabinet. Hearing Joe Hockey speak about how he finds windmills "utterly offensive" and "a blight on the landscape" brought this home to me. Hockey doesn't strike me having any aesthetic sensibilities at all and in reality probably wouldn't even notice a wind farm if he were chauffeured through the middle of one every day. He is obviously just regurgitating words put into his mouth by others.

If, as seems likely, Abbott gets a knife in the back some time soon, we should not be relieved that we have exorcised this demon. Whoever replaces him might quite easily be worse.

Imagine if we got someone who was a little bit cunning; smart enough to hide their intentions a little better and who was able to swallow their pride enough to negotiate with others.

Imagine if Abbott had been able to get Jacqui Lambie on side - and surely it would not be an onerous task for a warmonger to get an ex-military cop on side - he would not now be crippled by a hostile senate and he could get even more nasty legislation passed. In fact, imagine if he'd been able to negotiate with Rob Oakeshott and Tony Windsor (both closer in ideology to the Coalition than Labor) after the previous election - he could have formed government in 2010.

To make an analogy with the Game of Thrones; if Abbott were Joffrey, Scott Morrison would be Ramsay Bolton and Malcolm Turnbull would be Lord Baelish. Julie Bishop might be Cersei. [edit: I was also going to link Peter Dutton to Hordor, but Hordor was strong, good-natured and fulfilled a useful role.]

Swapping one of these for another is hardly cause for celebration.

I've heard it said that they wouldn't dare to replace Abbott after all of outrage they confected when Rudd was "knifed" by Gillard. And especially not by Bishop, who shares many of Gillard's characteristics (unmarried woman, no children, ex-lawyer, etc.) that the media attacked so fiercely. Sympathetic to the coalition though they are, the media wouldn't stand for it.

Like Hell they wouldn't!

They'd do a 180 degree turn so fast that the fillings would fly out of their teeth.

I can just see the Murdoch media now: Abbott would be portrayed as stepping aside gracefully in a statesman-like manner, and Bishop will reluctantly take the helm. It will all be because he was unable to sell his wonderful policies to the ignorant proles who don't understand what's good for them. He will be a martyr. Bishop will be a hero. The word "knifing" will never be uttered. If Rudd and Gillard are mentioned at all, it will only be to contrast the "civilised" and "adult" behaviour of the coalition to the "shambolic" and "vindictive" way the ALP handled a similar situation.

And of course, you'll see the media become ardent feminists overnight; at least in so far as this allows any criticism of Bishop to be written off as a misogynistic attack.

The beauty of the situation, at least from the point of view of the Coalition, is that those in the ALP have virtually no way to use this "knifing" to their advantage. Since the ALP defended Gillard in this same situation, they can't turn around and attack Bishop without having their own words turned against them. They can rail against media double standards of course, but that can simply be dismissed with the remark: "they would say that, wouldn't they".

Anyway, I'm not any good at predicting these things, but I'd be surprised if Abbott doesn't feel the cold steel between his shoulder blades within the next few months. And my money would be on Bishop wielding the knife.

If this happens, don't expect things to get any better; Abbott is merely the symptom, and not the disease.

Paved with good intentions

I thought I'd post something relevant to the party season.

Apparently the original source of the Party Safe logo.
Presumably the QLD Police have permission to use this.

Below is a note I received in the letterbox some time in the past year (names and dates removed to protect the innocent).

At first glance it's an extremely praiseworthy and considerate thing to do. I'm sure that if this blog had a big readership I'd be regaled with multiple horror stories (some of them maybe even true) of criminally inconsiderate neighbours partying to the point of a full-on Ferguson riot every other night; and everyone would be telling me how lucky I was to live in such a genteel neighbourhood.

But think about it from a different angle: Have we gone so far down the road to a totalitarian Police State that you have to register with the cops whenever you're going to have a party?

I checked out the web site referred to on the note and it appears that the registration process involves such things as getting supplied with identification wrist bands.

For a kid's birthday party!

Next there will be guards taking people's fingerprints at the door and making them step through a metal detector. Maybe they'll ban candles on the birthday cake as a fire hazard and you'll have to cut it with a plastic spatula (knives, of course, having been outlawed).

Don't get me wrong; I'm not criticising the people who sent this note. They're thoughtful people going out of their way to do the right thing; which is more than I could say for some. I'm just saddened that, these days, the "right thing" appears to be to unquestioning obedience to the Orwellian dictates of a Police State.

Brisbane's Berlin Wall

Last year, a law was passed in Queensland parliament to "provide for the safety and security of persons attending the Group of Twenty leaders’ summit in Brisbane in 2014".

Having heard disquieting things about this legislation, I decided to download a copy and look for myself, and it's as bad as they say. It goes without saying that it won't provide any additional "safety and security" - you just can't do that in a city full of people. It seems to be there for three reasons:

1. The usual Security Theatre. Window-dressing that looks like you're "doing something". Arse-covering if something happens.
2. Extra powers for the police. An early Christmas present for the loyal Boys in Blue. Queensland coppers love their extra powers and, even though the powers are for a limited duration, they'll be sure to make full use of them while they last.
3. Last, and certainly not least, to criminalise any form of protest against the summit. Section 18 of the legislation purports to allow for "lawful assembly", however § 18 (1) (c) states that if two or more people violate any of the sections of the act (and, as we will see, this can pretty much be guaranteed), the protest immediately becomes illegal. Moreover, much of the legislation can be used to harass and intimidate people pretty much at will.

Parts of the inner city are being fenced off, and the rest has been turned into a "declared area", within which there are extended powers of arrest and search . These powers are very wide-ranging and quite worrying. Some examples:

§ 33 (1) give the blanket permission: "A police officer may enter and search any premises in a restricted area without a warrant."

§ 27 (3) gives police officers the power to conduct a frisk search of a person of a different sex if "a police officer of the same sex is not immediately [my emphasis] available".  I don't see how that one could be abused.

They can of course use detection dogs, and are apparently protected from liability under § 35 (a) (ii) if this dog "physically intrudes onto a person or the clothing of a person" or "causes damage to a thing" that "may [my emphasis] have had in it or on it, a weapon or explosive". Despite the diplomatic wording, I can't see how this can be interpreted as anything other than permission to monster people with dogs with no comeback.

There is a "prohibited persons list", a blacklist compiled by the commissioner. § 51 (4) says that the commissioner "need not give reasons for the commissioner’s decision to retain a person’s name on the prohibited persons list", even if this defies "any rule of natural justice to the contrary".

To me, a blacklist is a perversion of justice. A person can be denied their rights at whim without being guilty of anything.

Persons on the blacklist will be prevented from entering the area for the duration of the conference. If they live within that area they will not be allowed to live in their own homes but will be forced to find accommodation elsewhere. Truly! The state has to pay "the cost of reasonable accommodation", but no other compensation, to the innocent person being thrown out of their own home.

But when we get to Schedule 6: Prohibited Items, the law goes from outrageous to outright ludicrous.

Let us have a look at some of the items that are prohibited within the city of Brisbane.

"3 (h) handcuffs"
[Source]

"3 (i) a whip"
[Source]

"14 a thing capable of disguising or concealing the 

identity of a person including camouflage paint or 

cream, a mask or a balaclava, but not including 

headwear, worn by a member of a religious group, of

a type customarily worn by members of the group"

[Source]

I have a feeling that some of the G20 leaders themselves might be at risk here.

"3 (m) glass bottles or jars"
[Source]

The humble jar of Vegemite; now banned! Is nothing sacred?

"3 (n) metal cans or tins"
[Source] 

I hate spam as much as anyone, but I wouldn't go so far as to classify it as dangerous in the physical sense.

"3 (o) projectiles, including, for example, 
stones, ball bearings or eggs"

[Source]

This one was no doubt spurred by the "eggpocalypse" which occurred during the recent Scottish independence referendum; A politician got egged and it was hyped up by the British media as if it was the worst crime since the holocaust, and maybe even more newsworthy than Julia Gillard losing her shoe (difficult though that is to believe).

But then the real agenda starts to show through:

"4 a placard or banner to which a timber, metal or plastic 
pole is attached or a banner more than 100cm high by 
200cm wide"

[Source]

Shush! It's not meant to be that obvious! You're meant to at least pretend it's all about the dreaded terrorists, and not about quashing legitimate protest.

Or are the terrorists going to smother people with their over-sized banners?

"11 a communication device, other than a mobile phone or other
telephone, capable of being used to organise activity designed to
disrupt any part of the G20 meeting, including, for example, a
two-way radio or a loud hailer, whether powered or not"

[Source]

...or announce their presence using megaphones?

"13 (j) a thing capable of being used to construct a stage,
platform, tripod or tower or a structure similar to a stage,
platform, tripod or tower, other than a camera tripod"

[Source]

...or exhibit themselves on a stage?

But now they've got their real reasons out of the way, time for a bit of weirdness.

"15 a manually operated surf ski or surfboard, kayak, boat or canoe"
[Source]

I have visions of insurgents, spear-guns ["3 (d) a spear gun"] at the ready, powering down the foetid swamp that is the Brisbane River on their surfboards, crying out "Cowabunga, you capitalist pig-dogs!"

"8 a reptile, insect or other animal capable of causing 

physical harm if released in close proximity to a person"

[Source]

Someone had some fun coming up with these.

"16 a floatation device"
[Source]

Seriously, I'm not making these up.

"17 a kite or other device suspended by airflow and
controlled by a string or cord attached to it"
[Source]

Truly...

But they didn't mention plastic oral thermometers with teddy-bear heads on them! Or did they?

"21 any other thing prescribed under a regulation"

This one seems to cover anything they want (note the use of "prescribed" rather than "proscribed").

So everyone, please take care when passing through Checkpoint Campbell this coming week.