In Trump’s and Murdoch’s crosshairs AOC defies death (ODT)
Author: peterimrich
Having dithered on real action to tackle global warming, some in the Coalition are now taking a keen interest in solving it — by going nuclear. Noel Wauchope investigates what’s behind the sudden push to overturn legislation prohibiting the exploration and mining of thorium and uranium and puts a definitive case against a nuclear industry in Australia.
via Nuclear lobby takes aim at Victoria to tackle prohibitions – Michael West
Ok, so it’s Monday. The stock market is in free fall, perhaps temporarily, perhaps not. What with Trump’s tariff games in play, that scary virus from China seems to be one of the few things getting into this country from that country. (Though Ivanka’s line of clothes is exempt from those tariffs.) Meanwhile, it looks like the polar regions , north and south, might soon become Margaritavilles.
But the good news is that most of the polls are positive about Bernie Sanders, my personal choice, winning the Democratic Party nomination to lead the fight against Trump in the fall. Most of the polls also show Bernie beating that rotten bastard, too. It’s also clear that he’d be a most formidable debate opponent against Trump.
via What the Hell is Wrong With Us? Are We Really This Stupid? | The Smirking Chimp
Any exchange between Jim Acosta and Trump is bound to be newsworthy at this stage of the game, but this was a real winner. Rather, Acosta was the real winner.
via Jim Acosta Wallops Trump Over Record Of Truth-telling | Crooks and Liars
During the first six months of 2019 alone, U.S. Africa Command tracked seven reports of American and allied attacks in Somalia that allegedly killed or wounded at least 18 civilians, according to internal AFRICOM documents obtained by The Intercept. But the U.S. does not acknowledge killing or wounding a single civilian in Somalia last year, according to AFRICOM spokesperson John Manley.
via U.S. Military Is Undercounting Civilian Casualties in Somalia
The Angus Taylor Plan of Economic Management (ODT)
The Heartland Institute and the Koch Bros are so “imaginative” They tried Dr Bjorn Lomborg and his CCC and sacked him now a new model has been let loose.(ODT)
“The Heartland Institute is funnelling anonymous money from the US to climate denial in other countries. It relies on the media to advance false equivalence strategies to attempt to normalise fringe beliefs. Climate denial is not a victimless crime, and it’s time for the perpetrators to be held accountable.”
via ‘Anti-Greta’ teen activist to speak at biggest US conservatives conference | US news | The Guardian
When Politics gets in the way of rationality (ODT)
via Carbon pricing: it’s a proven way to reduce emissions but everyone’s too scared to mention it
Trump is America’s Military weapons salesman while China sells them, consumer, goods that Americans really need (ODT)
Seibt is promoted by the Heartland Institute. The Koch bros Institute seems to miss an essential point. Neither Science nor those arguing the reality of man-made Climate Change being real are declaring it’s “all” only man made. However, the accumulated effect human activity has had on the accelerating the rate of change can’t be discounted as the trigger and only humans can alter that over the long term.
Righteous anger is a valid response to call for a stop on CO2 emissions. Given the history of denial, which has only recently seen a psuedo shift by denialists like the Kochs and remains neither scientific or rational but purely political, economic and self-interested the anger stems from concern for the common good of the planet. Seibt on that basis is a red herring just as Dr Bjorn Lomborg and his Coppenhagen Climate Council was when also financed by the Koch Bros to distract from the evidence science has and continues to accumulate for over the past 60 years. Today proving the negative influence CO2 emissions have on the planet’s changing climate. (ODT)
“I don’t want to get people to stop believing in man-made climate change, not at all,” she told the Washington Post on Monday, while acknowledging she found the idea that human activity alone was responsible for the warming planet “ridiculous.” The outlet’s profile of the young activist, whom it not-so-subtly dubs “the anti-Greta,” proceeds to paint her as a puppet of the Heartland Institute, which is “paying [Seibt] to question established climate science” – as if she would never have done so on her own.
Rather then give Seibt the benefit of the doubt, at least one other outlet pounced on WaPo for not being harsh enough on the German activist. Motherboard accused the outlet of “amplifying climate change denialism” from a “noted propaganda factory” that “can routinely be found peeing in the public discourse pool on behalf of its corporate donors.” Imagine what hell would break loose if anyone used such terms to describe Saint Greta…
Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation is on the slide, once again reporting a loss – $306.7 million for the September quarter – in stark contrast to its $186 million positive result at the same time last year.
Whistleblowers understand the conflict between the higher and lower path. It is a conflict of the conscience. Higher commitment requires the partisan to become impartial. The Senate trial required impartiality. Mitt Romney understood. Charles Grassley did not.
Listening to Senator Grassley, I heard what I have heard many times before. Grassley argued as opponents of whistleblowers argue. He diverted from the truth rather than commit to the truth.
Corruption inverts more than the truth. Grassley failed the Ukraine whistleblower. He failed the witnesses who supported the whistleblower. In his most important vote of all, he failed himself. He failed the test called whistleblowing.
via Senator Grassley reveals the extent of President Trump’s corruption
For example, in 2020 our gas output will probably outstrip that of Qatar which gets $26.6 billion in tax while Australia gets only $600 million. ExxonMobil Australia has a total income of $42.3 billion over the past five years. It has not paid one cent in income tax in this country.
McConnell is refusing legislation to make sure that they spend it in ways that will really lock down their systems. He’s refusing legislation that puts Russia on notice of sanctions for continuing to do it. He’s refusing to acknowledge publicly that Russia IS interfering in the 2020 election.
It’s hard to come to any conclusion other than McConnell is welcoming Russian interference because he’s counting on it to keep the White House and Senate under Republican control.
via Moscow Mitch Is Holding the 2020 Election Hostage for Trump and Putin | The Smirking Chimp
The New Silk Roads – or Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) – were launched by President Xi Jinping in 2013, first in Central Asia (Nur-Sultan) and then Southeast Asia (Jakarta).
One year later, the Chinese economy overtook the U.S. on a PPP basis. Inexorably, year after year since the start of the millennium, the U.S. share of the global economy shrinks while China’s increases.
China is already the key hub of the global economy and the leading trade partner of nearly 130 nations.
While the U.S. economy is hollowed out, and the casino financing of the U.S. government – repo markets and all – reads as a dystopian nightmare, the civilization-state steps ahead in myriad areas of technological research, not least because of Made in China 2025.
China largely beats the U.S. on patent filings and produces at least 8 times as many STEM graduates a year than the U.S., earning the status of top contributor to global science.
via No Weapon Left Behind: The American Hybrid War on China, by Pepe Escobar – The Unz Review
An unregistered lobbyist, a ministerial breach of the Lobbying Code of Conduct and a $2.6 million grant awarded during the election campaign minus pesky guidelines. Jommy Tee and Ronni Salt clear the pigs for take off.
The deputy prime minister, Michael McCormack, struck a pre-election deal with an unregistered political lobbyist and former Howard Government adviser, Andrew Gibbs, for a $2.6 million airport upgrade ahead of the launch of the Regional Airports Program (RAP). McCormack’s direct intervention mirrors Senator Bridget McKenzie in using taxpayers’ money for electioneering purposes. He also breached the Government’s Lobbying Code of Conduct.
The $100 million RAP was announced in the pork-laden 2019-20 Budget, just ahead of the election. It provided grants to upgrade infrastructure and deliver improved aviation safety and access at regional airports.
Pigs might fly: electioneering an airport at Cohuna – Michael West
Welcome to Australia the man above wasn’t (ODT
It is a question I am often asked. It is as though Australians can’t deal with the truth. They need a bedtime story, a happily-ever-after.
But where is the happily-ever-after for a people who die 10 years younger than other Australians? When you are among the most imprisoned people on Earth? When you have the country’s worst health, employment and education outcomes, where is the good news?
Yes, individuals – myself included – can do well. But don’t let that fool you. Adam Goodes did well and was still laid low.
via Indigenous Australians must tell the truth, so don’t ask us for fairytales
We will soon see how far Trump will go in abusing the pardon authority. He appears to be preparing to do far worse than handing out clemency for cash. The judge who sentenced Roger Stone to almost four years in prison accused the dirty trickster of lying to “protect the president.” When Trump pardons Stone, Paul Manafort and others implicated in the Russia scandal, he will cap the most troubling cover-up in American history.
via Why Trump Must Be Criminally Investigated for His Use of the Pardon Power | The Smirking Chimp
This passion for technology is newfound and insincere. In truth, our government has a long history of undermining climate technologies.
In the three years to 2016, the government ripped just shy of $1bn from the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (Arena), the body charged with helping early stage technologies through to commercial launch.The funding of a feasibility study for a coal power station in Collinsville and the foreshadowed gift of $11m to extend the life of the 42 years old Vales Point coal power station in the Hunter, demonstrate just how reluctant the Coalition is to let go of last century’s energy technologies.
One of the most promising and critical new technologies is the rapid maturation of the electric vehicle, but who can forget the government’s pushback against EVs during last year’s election?
olddogthoughts 
Dutton says he was referring to Islamic terrorists when he talked about ‘leftwing lunatics’ – as it happened