Month: June 2022

Gun Deaths USA

Guns in the US: Why the NRA is so Successful at preventing Reform

At least 60 votes are still needed to usher any legislation through the Senate and avoid a “filibuster”, which allows lawmakers to stall or prevent a vote on bills. Even apart from the NRA’s clout, a major challenge is that the gun control movement is subject to what political scientists label an “issue attention cycle”. In short, focus on the issue is fleeting. A calamity like the one in Texas gets considerable press for a while but then fades into the backdrop and is replaced by other headlines. The sustained political will needed to pass gun reform simply doesn’t persist.

For all the horror mass shootings, most gun violence in America occurs through a “slow drip” of casualties. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports that more than 45,000 Americans died from gun-related causes in 2020, with about 43% being homicides.

Source: Guns in the US: Why the NRA is so Successful at preventing Reform

Israel

Why does the world allow Israel to continue its oppression of Palestinians?

Israeli Jews protest with Palestinians standing in front of them, knowing that if they didn’t they would get shot. Israel claims to be a Liberal Democracy but it shoots journalists and jails those that strive for truth and justice. In 2022 the world can rely on the fact that Israel is not what it presents itself to be and certainly not what it once was when the world supported it during the the 6 Day War in 1967. Israel isn’t even a shadow of what it once was.

Thirty-one-year-old Ghofran Warasnah was shot dead by the Israeli occupation forces located at the entrance of Al-Arroub Palestinian refugee camp near Hebron. Ghofran was a Palestinian journalist who was heading to work. According to reports paramedics were barred from reaching her for 20 minutes and the ambulance carrying her dead body was attacked by Israeli forces. This brings to mind the murder of Shireen Abu Akleh.

Source: Why does the world allow Israel to continue its oppression of Palestinians?

Fight against Fake News, Fighting Fake News

Old Dog Thought- Reflections on demotion

Fighting Fake News with REAL 8/6/22; Reflections on Morrison, The true decievers;

Julian Assange

Enough is enough: PM Albanese must now intervene for Assange

Prime Minister Albanese has said that the pursuit of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange served no purpose; it is now time to do all in his power to bring him home, writes Dr Binoy Kampark.

Source: Enough is enough: PM Albanese must now intervene for Assange

Informed Comment

Who is it that can’t manage money? – » The Australian Independent Media Network

If only we had of voted Morrison in we’d have never known

“The economy was weaker in the March quarter than was forecast at election time.

“Growth at 0.8 per cent was…much weaker than what was expected for the corresponding period in the pre-election fiscal outlook”.

He added: “Consumption, dwelling investment, new business investment export and the nominal GDP were all weaker in the March quarter than was anticipated by our predecessors in the Budget and by the departments at PFO.”

“Although the national accounts are notoriously backward looking, if you think about what has happened in the economy since the end of March: inflation is higher, we have had an interest rate hike, petrol prices are up 12 per cent since the end of April, wholesale electricity prices are up 237 per cent since the end of March, and gas more than 300 per cent higher than the average of the last few years.”

Robust in parts, resilient in parts, but with rising inflation, chickens coming home to roost, and a perfect storm of energy rate spikes.

Who is it that can’t manage money?

 

 

Source: Who is it that can’t manage money? – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Informed Comment

Barnaby sounds worried – » The Australian Independent Media Network

For years, he has been doling out money hand over fist, often to people with connections to the Liberal or National parties, for water rights or dubious dams.

There was the Politics in the Pub night in Shepparton where Joyce promised irrigators more water from the Murray-Darling.

“We have taken water, put it back into agriculture, so we could look after you and make sure we don’t have the greenies running the show.”

He dismissed a Four Corners program about water theft as “them trying to take more water off you, trying to create a calamity.”

Never mind about fish kills and dried up rivers and towns with no drinking water.

Then there was ‘Watergate’ where Barnaby paid $80 million to a company with connections to Angus Taylor for worthless overland water flows.

Urannah dam is a whole other can of worms with hundreds of millions being funnelled to a company run by people with links to the LNP for a project facing serious questions about its economic benefit.

Likewise the Dungowan dam proposed for Barnaby’s own electorate, where he said he has “no real interest” in seeing the business case because “we’re not asking for a return”.

In March, Joyce promised $5.4 billion to build the Hells Gate dam on the Burdekin River despite there being no business case and no assessment of the environmental impacts yet.

Barnaby’s baby, the Inland Rail, also deserves scrutiny.

Source: Barnaby sounds worried – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Uninformed Comment

Peter Dutton 2.0 – The re-imagining – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Two idiots with no ideas of their own Andrew Bolt and Dutton chat on Sky News demanding “parents should decide the national curriculum”. So what do elected governments in a democracy get paid for?   Not a word on how that should be achieved if it wasn’t their job? Parents should stop work and homeschool and assess their kids any way they want one can only assume.

... Australia’s version of Sean Hannity, Andrew Bolt, Dutton revealed how that ‘soft’ side will dictate his behavior. Taking a leaf out of the playbook of the absurd Republicans such as Sarah Palin and Marjorie Taylor Greene he unveiled his first target in his quest to win back the sensible middle. That is to attack teachers using the treatment of LGBTIQA+ students as his weapon of choice. The assault in the US on these children is obscene and the right wing of our Liberal Party has its own history using teachers as the focus of their dog-whistle tactics.

Dutton…. With the enthusiastic encouragement of Bolt he made is initial gambit in presenting what will be his friendly, softer side. He firstly attacked those radical teachers who, as part of the Union movement, control the ALP, uninterested in the fact that the Teachers Union is not affiliated with the Australian Council of Trade Unions.

…. Dutton has embraced this right-wing diatribe questioning the values of the National Curriculum and parroting almost word for word Florida’s Republican Governor, Ron DeSanto’s views that parents are excluded from the teaching of their children. Dutton’s articulation of this right-wing position is that he ‘wants to shine a light on (the exclusion of parent’s rights) and let parents be the judges on what is being taught in schools’.

How far away are we from the condemnation of critical race theory? Not far when you consider the Ramsay Centre’s history curriculum based on the premise that the civilization of western values are superior to those in non-western cultures. Tony Abbott, after all, has insisted on the need for the Ramsay Centre to be explicitly “right-wing”.

Source: Peter Dutton 2.0 – The re-imagining – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Capitalism

Capitalists Want Your Retirement to Be Miserable

Finance’s conquest of the supports necessary to deal with the universal human fate of growing old spells certain disaster for our golden years. The retirement-financial complex should be fought tooth and claw.

Source: Capitalists Want Your Retirement to Be Miserable

Coal

It is now Cheaper to Switch from Coal directly to Wind and Solar than to Natural Gas

Another problem with “natural” gas as a bridge is that much gas production in the US is now via hydraulic fracturing or “fracking,” which releases large amounts of methane into the atmosphere. Methane does not stay in the atmosphere as long as CO2, but it is 25 times more potent as a heat-trapping gas. Our current methane crisis appears to derived from fracked wells that have been left uncapped.

Source: It is now Cheaper to Switch from Coal directly to Wind and Solar than to Natural Gas

Peter Dutton

Peter Dutton hints at controversial shift towards nuclear power

dutton nuclear

Dutton’s idea for the next century when the LNP will be dead and buried like its once proposed nuclear waste dump on Indigenous land. Meanwhile the rest of the world will be running on energy from the sun and the natural movement of the planet and mining of fossil fuels a forgotten nightmare.

New Opposition Leader Peter Dutton appears set to bring a debate about nuclear power back to the centre of Australian politics.

Source: Peter Dutton hints at controversial shift towards nuclear power

LNP, LNP Corruption, LNP Tactics

The Coalition didn’t do much on nuclear energy while in office. Why are they talking about it now? | Nuclear power | The Guardian

Hinkley Point C nuclear plant under construction in the UK

The con: Is the delay. It is in and money to be made in distracting the transition to a more rapid closure of the fossil fuel industry even if the case for renewable clean energy has been proved. If you can’t beat the argument’s direction of progress then delay it for as long as possible. Just as the LNP, IPA and Murdoch are a coalition for the defense of fossil fuels and will now continue to be, while declaring they are on board with reducing emissions and profiting from their efforts.

the Institute of Public Affairs, a rightwing group with a history of climate science denial that is supported by fossil fuel and mining interests, released what it described as polling showing people were open to the idea of nuclear energy. News Corp newspapers ran its arguments uncritically.

Why does the case for nuclear energy persist?

There is an assumption by some people, including Coalition MPs, that renewable energy cannot do the job, despite the expert advice that says otherwise. These critiques rarely address that advice head on.

But there is also a long history of nuclear energy being used as a delaying tactic for acting on climate change in Australia, including by fossil fuel interests.

Source: The Coalition didn’t do much on nuclear energy while in office. Why are they talking about it now? | Nuclear power | The Guardian

Climate Change

A huge Atlantic ocean current is slowing down. If it collapses, La Niña could become the norm for Australia

No one laughs at God in a hospital but the LNP and Sky News After Dark do. Medicine like Climate science isn’t an exact but the Deniers appreciate and take advice from doctors if and when it suits their interests. When it doesn’t they become anti-vaxxers pout scream but still expect hospitals and doctors to take care of them and their children. Hospitals are dealing with more Covid now than ever before and now they blame Dan Andrews for giving them what they wanted. They check the weather forecasts and act accordingly but laugh at Climate science simply because it suits their interests to demand it to be exact not skeptical the very nature of the inquiry, research and it’s resulting predictions.

Climate change is slowing down the conveyor belt of ocean currents that brings warm water from the tropics up to the North Atlantic. Our research, published today in Nature Climate Change, looks at the profound consequences to global climate if this Atlantic conveyor collapses entirely.

Source: A huge Atlantic ocean current is slowing down. If it collapses, La Niña could become the norm for Australia

Israel

Israel’s assaults on public health infrastructure amount to war crimes | The Electronic Intifada

A young girl is treated on a hospital bed

They shoot Palestinians, journalists bomb hospitals ensuring those they shoot have no chance of medical care, and then declare they are “defending themselves”. The world is shocked by Putin’s attack on Ukraine but say nothing about what Israel has been doing for decades and calls normal.

In May 2021, the Israeli military dropped hundreds of bombs on the Gaza Strip, destroying houses, schools, businesses, and health care facilities.

Perhaps nowhere was the human toll of that month more apparent than at al-Shifa hospital, the “only hospital in Gaza equipped for emergency assistance.”

Source: Israel’s assaults on public health infrastructure amount to war crimes | The Electronic Intifada

Israel

Israel’s peace camp is taking up bulldozers to fight the occupation

Activists from several left-wing Israeli groups gather for a photo in front of a bulldozer ahead of a protest against the Homesh outpost, May 28, 2022. (Oren Ziv)

Jews protest like Palestinians but don’t get shot why is that?

In contrast to the actions of the radical left in the West Bank, however, only Israelis participated in this protest. “It is clear that if Palestinians tried to do such a thing, they would encounter live ammunition,” said Mills. “We are taking advantage of our privilege here.”

Source: Israel’s peace camp is taking up bulldozers to fight the occupation

Fight against Fake News, Fighting Fake News

Old Dog Thought- It only took a decade for the LNP to have us slide down the International corruption and Democracy ladders to our lowest point

Fighting Fake News with REAL, 7/6/22 Truth In Humour; ABC, Who’s Peter Dutton?;Susan Ley; ICAC, Ruperts Helpers; Barnaby at the RSL;

Uncategorized

Don’t blame Labor for surging energy prices, blame Howard – » The Australian Independent Media Network

I believe it goes back to the Howard Government, when LNG exports first began. Howard gave the gas extractive industry a huge leg-up, by not requiring them to provide for any sort of strategic domestic reserve. They were basically granted a laissez faire, free and unfettered share of the market without accountability to the national interests at the domestic level.

People might screech and whine all they like about a two-week old government confronted by this event. All it means, though, is that regardless of the evidence, nothing will convince an idiot otherwise.

Source: Don’t blame Labor for surging energy prices, blame Howard – » The Australian Independent Media Network

LNP Economic Management

National accounts mark Coalition ‘F’ for Fail on the economy

LAST WEDNESDAY’S national accounts confirm what voters have apparently already decided — that the Morrison Government was not that great at economic management after all.

Source: National accounts mark Coalition ‘F’ for Fail on the economy

Informed Comment

It is hard to fathom what a hateful place Australia has become – » The Australian Independent Media Network

We have become a hateful place over the last decade – suspicious of each other, greedy, unprincipled, uncaring, focused only on what’s in it for me.

The election showed the country is ready for a reset. It will be up to all of us to be part of that. We can and must do better.

Source: It is hard to fathom what a hateful place Australia has become – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Pacific Region

Australian Diplomacy in the Pacific Is Driven by Self-Interest

Australia’s Labor government is promising Pacific countries a new and friendlier era in diplomatic relations. But without challenging the vested interests and right-wing politics that dominate the region, these promises are altogether empty.

The new opposition Liberal Party leader (and previous immigration minister) Peter Dutton was famously caught on camera joking about the threat of rising seas to Pacific Islands. This was just one example of the “disrespect” Penny Wong has repeatedly referred to on her Pacific tour.

But Australia’s neglect of its climate commitments and the existential threat it continues to pose to its neighbors is not fundamentally an attitude problem. It’s a problem of interests.

Source: Australian Diplomacy in the Pacific Is Driven by Self-Interest

Newscorp

Peter Van Onselen, who has a history of stalking women online, has attempted to intimidate Tegan George before her court hearing against Channel 10 which is a criminal offence – Kangaroo Court of Australia

Peter van Onselen and his supporters Kate McClymont, Neil McMahon and Samantha Maiden

Peter Van Onselen, who works for News Corp, Channel 10 and has a history of stalking women online, is now facing the possibility of being charged with contempt of court in journalist Tegan George’s legal proceedings against Channel 10.

Source: Peter Van Onselen, who has a history of stalking women online, has attempted to intimidate Tegan George before her court hearing against Channel 10 which is a criminal offence – Kangaroo Court of Australia

Uncategorized

New Veterans Affairs spokesman Barnaby Joyce begins mammoth tour of all 1,135 RSL front bars | The Shovel

In what he describes as a ‘fact-finding mission’, the Coalition’s new Veterans Affairs spokesperson Barnaby Joyce has set out on a three-year tour that will see him get to personally know the bar facilities of every RSL club in the country.

Source: New Veterans Affairs spokesman Barnaby Joyce begins mammoth tour of all 1,135 RSL front bars | The Shovel

drugs

Canada’s drug experiment could work here. This is why

The criminalisation of drugs creates stigma towards people who use them.

The Canadian government’s announcement that it will trial decriminalisation of drugs in British Columbia for three years may seem radical to some outside observers, but for those of us in the alcohol and other drug field, it’s been a long time coming.

Source: Canada’s drug experiment could work here. This is why

Ukraine

Volodymyr Zelenskyy visits frontline cities as Russia resumes strikes on Ukraine’s capital Kyiv – ABC News

Source: Volodymyr Zelenskyy visits frontline cities as Russia resumes strikes on Ukraine’s capital Kyiv – ABC News

Trump

Deconstructed: Can Democrats Win in Rural America?

Chloe Maxmin flipped a Trump district in her run for a Maine Senate seat. In her new book, she offers Democrats a recipe for replicating that success.

Source: Deconstructed: Can Democrats Win in Rural America?

Fight against Fake News, Fighting Fake News

Old Dog Thought- Watch Dutton will return to Abbott’s method of opposition. No Morrison/ Trump’s showmanship. He’ll be a slugger of irrational fear, hate, and division.

Fighting Fake News with REAL 6/6/22; Decade of Hate, Division & Culture Wars; Hidden Economic Realities Revealed, Foundation of Energy Prices;

Peter Dutton

Dutton Dressed as Lamb: Dissecting The Image – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Conclusion: Dutton Dressed as Lamb I hope that this article has shone some light on the sheer crap that is the media’s attempt to rehabilitate The Dark Lord. As I said in the opening paragraph, his record in government is too recent and too well documented for this to work, but I thought I would add my voice to the chorus of detractors. No matter how much the media tries to create and run with this new Dutton, the people know who he really is. His recent (and central) role in a government so thoroughly rejected in the polls should be too much to overcome, but with our press, one can never be sure.

Source: Dutton Dressed as Lamb: Dissecting The Image – » The Australian Independent Media Network

ALP Government,

Federal anti-corruption body to have scope to investigate ‘what they see fit’, Anthony Albanese says
May be an image of 1 person, eyeglasses and text that says 'theaustralian.com.au Ruston wary of watchdog becoming 'political witch hunt' Liberal senator Anne Ruston has warned against creating a federal anti- corruption agency that would lead to a political witch hunt, as the Coalition...'
When the anti-corruption body gets up and running, I envisage there will be a few politicians quaking in their shoes with the worry of will ‘I’ be next or indeed first cab of the rank. This is good news for every Australian opposed to the corruption we have seen in the former Morrison government.

The prime minister has indicated the car park and sports rorts affairs could be investigated by the national anti-corruption commission his government has promised to establish.

Source: Federal anti-corruption body to have scope to investigate ‘what they see fit’, Anthony Albanese says

Peter Dutton

Is Dutton Labor’s ‘secret weapon’? – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Peter Dutton has finally become the leader of something. It is a disorganised rabble, but I am sure he is thrilled. Opposition Leader, and he is already talking about swooping in and fixing “Labor’s inevitable mess” in 2025. This is truly delusional, and uncoupled from reality.

Source: Is Dutton Labor’s ‘secret weapon’? – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Informed Comment

Will the hateful army who bullied Yassmin Abdel-Magied come after Australia’s diverse new parliamentarians? | Sisonke Msimang | The Guardian

If the euphoria and back-patting over the federal election results are anything to go by, Australia is a vastly different country from the one Yassmin Abdel-Magied left five years ago.

A new cohort of confident, competent, successful and ethnically diverse parliamentarians are about to enter public life. They have been widely celebrated as a sign that the country is getting multiculturalism right.

Anyone unlucky enough to have the combination of confidence and ‘difference’ will be in for a rough ride

Source: Will the hateful army who bullied Yassmin Abdel-Magied come after Australia’s diverse new parliamentarians? | Sisonke Msimang | The Guardian

Informed Comment

Michael Pascoe: Time to chill about election – we’re regaining balance

This election was simply about the arrogance and corruption of the Morrison Government and its backers. As long as Morrison,Dutton, Ley Taylor Cash, Tudge, Hawke,and Robert remain in the Liberal Party it will never be regarded as anything but, a bunch of arrogant and corrupt maggots who dislike each other.

It was the Morrison government’s arrogance that it thought it could simply dictate to the electorate what the Liberal and National parties’ sponsors wanted it to be, along with buying votes through unprecedented corruption and abuse of power.So don’t panic even if you’ve drunk the Kool-Aid about a Labor government being a threat to civilisation. In the end, the centre wins.

Source: Michael Pascoe: Time to chill about election – we’re regaining balance

Informed Comment

New Brooms, Old Stories: The Australian Labor Party and Julian Assange – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Opposition legal affairs spokesman George Brandis failed to identify any relevant law that might have been breached, either Australian or US. Liberty Victoria president Spencer Zifcak was “astonished” that a lawyer of presumed competence could have made such remarks. “There is no charge, there is no trial, there is no properly constituted court, and yet the Prime Minister deems it appropriate to say that Mr Assange has committed a criminal offence.”

Within less than a fortnight, the AFP, in concluding its investigation, informed Attorney-General Robert McClelland that “given the documents published to date are classified by the United States, the primary jurisdiction for any further investigation into the matter remains the United States.” After evaluating the material concerned, the federal police had failed to establish “the existence of any criminal offences where Australia would have jurisdiction.”

Source: New Brooms, Old Stories: The Australian Labor Party and Julian Assange – » The Australian Independent Media Network

LNP Economic Management, LNP Government

The economy is growing but workers are not getting the benefits – ABC News

A female mine worker walks past a mine dump truck at a coal mine in central Queensland.

This week’s National Accounts show the economy growing solidly. But the growth is mainly benefiting businesses, especially mining businesses, while workers’ wages fall further behind. The

Source: The economy is growing but workers are not getting the benefits – ABC News

LNP

Working class moves Left under conditions of crisis

Morrison took Trump’s highway to the election WA told him to piss off and Qld didn’t cry welcome. The current leader of the now Opposition a Banana Bender lost 50% of the small margin he had. Heads will roll in the back office.

The Election delivered a severe blow to the project of consolidating far-Right politics through electoral processes. The Liberal Party is hopelessly split due to the ruling class divisions over climate change. It has effectively lost its base in the upper middle classes of the cities. The far-Right minor party vote largely did not eventuate.

Source: Working class moves Left under conditions of crisis

Climate Science

Climate scientists warn of increased climate change events as carbon emissions fail to drop – ABC News

Source: Climate scientists warn of increased climate change events as carbon emissions fail to drop – ABC News

Climate Change

The last Time our Atmosphere had 421 ppm of Carbon Dioxide, Florida was under Water and Giant Camels and Rhinoceri roamed Indiana

Source: The last Time our Atmosphere had 421 ppm of Carbon Dioxide, Florida was under Water and Giant Camels and Rhinoceri roamed Indiana

Fight against Fake News, Fighting Fake News

Old Dog Thought- Morrison Murdoch’s Rabbit hole sucked Australia down

Fighting Fake News with REAL 5/6/22; Murdoch Media, Morrison’s Rabbit Hole; Christine Holgate; Linda Burney;

Democracy

Elections: a Global Ranking rates US Weakest among Liberal Democracies

Australia ranks equal 36th in the world out of the 78 country list of Liberal Democracies. Why is it we always slide down when the LNP is in government? The worst and obvious being this recent decade?

The Australian LNP modeled itself on making Australia more American and they still do. Read American politics and you will see the LNP adopting American Republican policies in a kneejerk reaction because they actually have no homegrown ones of their own and currently have an interim Leader that may not even make it to the next election. Who is sitting in waiting one wonders.

By Toby James, University of East Anglia; and Holly Ann Garnett, Royal Military College of Canada | – Defending democracy has suddenly become one of the central challenges of our age. The land war in Ukraine is widely considered a front line between autocratic rule and democratic freedom. The United States continues to absorb the meaning of the riot that took place on January 6 2021 in an attempt to overthrow the result of the previous year’s election. Elsewhere, concerns have been raised that the pandemic could have provided cover for governments to postpone elections. Elections are an essential part

Source: Elections: a Global Ranking rates US Weakest among Liberal Democracies

Informed Comment

One that the Murdoch media got horribly wrong – » The Australian Independent Media Network

My thought for the day Would you rather play in a team of champions or a champion team? ( John Lord )

So, what comes out of all this rejection of Murdoch and his acolytes? There are still some good sports pages to read and pics galore, but I wouldn’t trust the politics.

In debating their tactics with colleagues and friends, I have noticed that the Sky (and Fox) viewership seems to be marked by a collective personality disorder whereby the viewer feels almost as though they’ve been let into a secret society. Arguably, this has been the election in which the bias of its tilted reporting has been exposed?

When the polls have been analysed to the nth degree, and all the data is done and dusted, one of the biggest stories of this election will be how Murdoch’s News Corp failed to have the desired influence on the result. From newspapers to television; it has become impotent. Maybe forever. I want to think so.

Source: One that the Murdoch media got horribly wrong – » The Australian Independent Media Network

LNP

Peter Dutton On Education And Re-education… – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Goebbels and a would-be Hitler Importing the American Republican New Dream of the total Re-eduction of Australia.

Now, let me be quite clear here: I’m not being overly sensitive to Peter Dutton’s recent comments because I’ve spent a large part of my professional life in schools. Ok, I’m a teacher and, according to our new leader, I’m an extremist… Wait, that’s right. Peter Dutton isn’t our new leader. The Liberals didn’t win…

As Pleasant Pete said: “…If it was limited to just environmental issues or just to climate change, it would be bad enough… extremism is some of the teachers and the language they use, the approach that they take, it’s across a broad range of public policy areas and I think the national curriculum, the values argument is going to be one of the big debates over this parliament and I think you will see a big difference between the policies we take to the next election compared to what Labor will. Labor is completely and utterly dominated by the union movement as you know and the teachers’ union is one of the strongest voices in the ALP and not in a good way!”

That’s the actual quote so if it seems to be a little disjointed that may be because he had to stop and remember that he’s a nice man now that he doesn’t have any of those nasty portfolios that demand you drag families out of their beds in the middle of the night or tell rape victims that they can’t have an abortion because we will decide who comes into this country and the circumstances, etc.

But it was his comments on history that demonstrated exactly how much he’s changed. He said that he didn’t want teachers “teaching a different view of history”. Teachers should stick to the actual facts of what happened.

Now, this is a perfectly reasonable demand for a leader to make. After all, that’s the idea that Hitler, Mao, Pol Pot, Stalin and various other strong leaders had. There are certain facts and you stick to them and if you seem to think that there aren’t we can educate you at the re-education camp.

Yes, not teaching a different view of history begs the question: “Different view from who or what?”

Source: Peter Dutton On Education And Re-education… – » The Australian Independent Media Network

ALP Government,

After the Coalition’s failure, there is no higher duty than being Australia’s environment minister | Amelia Young | The Guardian

Tanya Plibersek with governor general David Hurley being sworn in as environment minister

An Australian environment minister carries this responsibility in a way that environment ministers from other countries don’t: Australia as the long-isolated island ark, has flora and fauna like nothing else on the globe.

So when political commentators say that Tanya Plibersek has been “demoted” to the role of Australian environment minister, I wonder what higher responsibility a government minister in 2022 could possibly carry.

Source: After the Coalition’s failure, there is no higher duty than being Australia’s environment minister | Amelia Young | The Guardian

History

Cold welcome: another chapter in Labor’s hard luck story – Michael West

Over in a minute: Prime Minister Tony Abbott (centre) with former Australian prime ministers Malcolm Fraser, Julia Gillard, Bob Hawke, John Howard, Kevin Rudd and Paul Keating, at the completion of the Gough Whitlam memorial service in Sydney.

The history of Labor has always been to clean up the self-crowned “better managers” mess.They have always been there to give the nation a “progressive shove”, and get going again. When we are on the road to progress, and moving forward the LNP step up the chorus calling it a mess and echoing “we are the better managers”. If the 24/7 news cycle actually printed the news along with a little critical precise of our historical facts the LNP might just feel they need to pitch in and actually help this country instead of themselves and their minority of friends. I remember feeling the dark shadow of fear that pass over us when Abbott came to Government. Simply compare Fraser Abbott and Howard with Whitlam, Hawke, Keating,Rudd and Gillard.

No sooner back in office and the ALP is hit with a crisis. The gas shortages plaguing the east coast have all the makings of a giant clusterfrig from the parties of government.

Labor, while holding power only a third of the time in Australia’s history, seems doomed to get the call from the electorate just as trouble is brewing.

Jim Scullin’s team took office in October 1929, the month the Wall Street crash unleashed the Great Depression. John Curtin took over in 1941 as Japan was preparing to widen the war in the Pacific. Gough Whitlam’s ambitious program was derailed when the quadrupling of oil prices in 1973 unleashed rampant inflation and unemployment in the Western world.

Bob Hawke had better luck, coming to power in 1983 as a long drought broke. But Kevin Rudd was hit with the global financial crisis in 2008.

We can only wish Team Albo better luck in the long term.

Source: Cold welcome: another chapter in Labor’s hard luck story – Michael West

Filed under:
ALP Government,

Crikey Worm: Classical gas

Anthony Albanese government cabinet

Good morning, early birds. The Albanese government is considering reserving gas for the east coast in a bid to stabilise energy prices, and NDIS Minister Bill Shorten says he will crack down people misusing the NDIS. It’s the news you need to know, with Emma Elsworthy.

Source: Crikey Worm: Classical gas

clean energy, Energy, Green Energy, Solar Energy

All of a sudden energy from the sun and wind is looking very affordable – » The Australian Independent Media Network

He couldn’t tell the truth before he was elected how could he be expected to tell it before this recent election? Energy prices were going up despite the Ukraine not because of it.

On 30 April, less than a month before the election I penned this piece, about the foreshadowed spike in energy prices, about to hit Australian consumers: Coalition promises higher electricity costs! I wrote it because it was quite clear that the Coalition were not going to come clean before the election and it was a known major factor that was going to hit Australian businesses and consumers as winter came on.

Source: All of a sudden energy from the sun and wind is looking very affordable – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Capitalism

Capitalists Are Bad at Weed Legalization

Capitalist society can only ever legalize cannabis in a way that benefits the already wealthy. Why not put the newly legal weed industry in the hands of the public and away from the profit motive?

Source: Capitalists Are Bad at Weed Legalization

Ukraine

Ukraine’s street-by-street battle to stop Russian push

Russian forces have advanced deep into the ruined eastern factory city of Sievierodonetsk, but Ukrainian troops are still holding out there as Russia’s assault on its neighbour entered its 100th day.

Source: Ukraine’s street-by-street battle to stop Russian push

Fight against Fake News, Fighting Fake News

Old Dog Thought- He’s too busy preparing a Non-Disclosure Agreement before he leaves

Fighting Fake News with REAL 4/6/22; Morrison sees the benefit of Social Housing; There’s No “I” in this Team; There has been only “I”s in the other

LNP

Kevin Rudd: I don’t believe Peter Dutton regrets walking out on the Apology to the Stolen Generations | The Canberra Times | Canberra, ACT

Politicians of the Liberal kind have no real fundamental principles other than maintaining the economic interests of their donors. However, they do believe the 24/7 news cycle enables them to become chameleons change and like a laundromat have their histories erased but little else. There is no such thing as a fresh Dutton Taylor, Robert, Cash. There is no such thing as a Liberal Party whose interests are all Australia’s

Australians should be deeply concerned that Peter Dutton – the man who proudly marched out on the Apology to Indigenous Australians – stands unopposed within the Liberal Party as its alternative prime minister.

While his emergence as Opposition Leader has renewed scrutiny of his motivations back in 2008, this was just one of many troubling chapters in Dutton’s three-decade career that expose his serial failure to empathise with anyone he perceives as different.

Source: Kevin Rudd: I don’t believe Peter Dutton regrets walking out on the Apology to the Stolen Generations | The Canberra Times | Canberra, ACT

Peter Dutton

Inside the Republicans’ Rebranding as the “Parents Party”

This why Peter Dutton is a follower and not a leader. His ideas are simply imported and plagiarised from America’s Republicans. The current rebranding of the Liberal Party as the “Family and Small Business Party” is just one example. The Liberals were never a “Grassroots” movement they never represented the “community” as the Teals have. Yet they now have their eyes set on taking over outer suburban community organizations like schools, and councils and rebranding themselves as their American mentors are doing. Dutton has his eyes on education and what’s taught in schools Making out that Liberal interests are cultural not the interests of the big end of town. Dutton is just a follower with Murdoch is his marketing manager trying to make us ever more right-wing American

In the liberal suburbs of Fairfax County, Virginia, conservative parents like Carrie Lukas have come to local school board meetings to air their frustrations with the failures of the public school system during the Covid-19 pandemic. In late January, Lukas used her two minutes during public comment to criticize mask mandates and call for school privatization.

But when Lukas came to the microphone, she represented more than her family. As the president of a right-wing think tank called the Independent Women’s Forum, Lukas also advanced the interests of her billionaire donors: some of America’s wealthiest people who, for decades, have backed efforts to defund public schools, attack teachers unions, and undermine the scientific community.

Source: Inside the Republicans’ Rebranding as the “Parents Party”

Peter Dutton

FLASHBACK 2018: Peter Dutton — the would-be PM and overlord

Peter Dutton has entered his new role as Opposition Leader with a reputation as a hard-right conservative, devoid of compassion.

Even since this article from 2018 by managing editor Michelle Pini, the propaganda machine hasn’t stopped portraying him as a “good bloke”.

Source: FLASHBACK 2018: Peter Dutton — the would-be PM and overlord