Category: Uncategorized
The Trump administration did not consult the Palestinians in drawing up the plan, which gives away East Jerusalem and 30% of the Palestinian West Bank to Israel. The Palestinians may as well, Palestine foreign minister Saeb Erekat said, just withdraw from the 1995 Interim Agreement on Oslo.
Trump appears to have decided to unveil the Israel-Palestine plan on Tuesday to take the pressure off from his Senate impeachment trial and to shore up his support from the Jewish and evangelical communities. A majority of Americans in polls say they want Trump impeached and removed from office.
Morrison’s It’s all too much Australia pray! Frydenbergs resilient Nation is waiting for the NBN to kick in while the world passes by. (ODT)
No action from Morrison Government as NBN continues downward trend
Tony Abbott tried to set up a Climate Council within our Universities with the cheap $4million Bribe and Dr Bjorn Blomborg sold to us by News Corp as the world’s foremost intellect on Climate Change why? So Abbott could control “his” argument on Climate. Abbott did much the same supporting the Ramsay Foundation’s bribe of Universities to control our Culture and History. Again with the full backing and sale by News Corp The Spectator and Quadrant.
Twiggy Forrest is doing an Abbott controlling his Philanthropic Grant to consolidate his and Mining’s message on Climate. This isn’t generosity driven by any means but rather a bribe and grab for power and the privatisation of the Science much the same as when big Tobacco and Big Pharma wanted to control the research and thus the message vitally needed to serve their interests rather than the Common Good . Forrest is a Miner afterall. (ODT)
What Andrew Forest does is avoid paying tax and instead makes donations, so that he gets to control who and how the money is used, while also building up his reputation as a good Aussie bloke.
Not one Australian has voted for Twiggy and yet he helps set government policy, along with his profiteering climate change denier mates.
A true philanthropist is one that gives; not one who seeks fame and glory or the power to control how their gift is used.
It’s likely that Andrew Twiggy Forest is far from a true philanthropist.
Dutton is keeping up his reputation from the worst Minister for Health ever to the worst Homeland Minister. He simply doesn’t no what he’s doing. (ODT)
There are possible explanations for Dutton’s and Pezzullo’s failure in the bushfire emergency.
The first is sheer incompetence and the collapsed morale in the Department of Home Affairs. Abul Rizvi has cited numerous examples of just that.
The second explanation is, as an insider in Emergency Management Australia (EMA) told me, the focus in EMA has been the possible threat of terrorism to the neglect of other threats like bushfires. Presumably, this focus has been at the direction of Dutton and Pezzullo. This is consistent with the way we know that Dutton and Pezzullo have operated for many years — frighten us about the threat of terrorism because that delivers more political dividends.
Or is there just confusion in the Government about who is responsible? Is there shared responsibility with the Minister for Agriculture and Water David Littleproud?
At least one thing is very clear and that is the responsibility of the Department of Home Affairs for Commonwealth Emergency Management. It has failed in that responsibility.
Momentum is growing to call witnesses to Donald Trump’s impeachment trial after it was revealed his former national security advisor has written a book manuscript saying Trump directly tied military aid to Ukraine to politically-motivated investigations.
The revelations about John Bolton’s forthcoming book have shaken up the Senate impeachment trial, which appeared to be moving toward a speedy acquittal for Trump as early as the end of the week.
via ‘This is a game-changer’: John Bolton revelations upend Trump’s impeachment trial
Is Trump’s Impeachment raising Bernie? (ODT)
According to a Media Matters review Fox News prime-time hosts completely ignored the devastating bushfires raging across Australia during the first three months of the crisis It was only after a Rupert Murdoch-owned Australian newspaper started pushing a misleading talking point about arson that Fox’s Tucker Carlson, Sean Hannity, and Laura Ingraham picked up the story to distract from the role of climate change in accelerating the crisis.
Members of Trump’s impeachment team have been fixtures on cable news, primarily Fox
Conservatives complaining about NPR’s government funding is nothing new. In his budget proposals, Trump has repeatedly signaled a desire to eliminate funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which distributes government funds to public TV and radio stations. So far, that hasn’t happened.
It’s also important to note that only a small portion of NPR’s funding actually comes from tax dollars. According to its latest financial report, just 1 percent of its annual operating budget consists of “grants from Corporation for Public Broadcasting and federal agencies and departments.” Most of its funding comes from corporate sponsorships and dues paid by member stations across the country. Those member stations in turn receive about 12 percent of their funding from the CPB and other federal, state, and local government sources. Some stations also receive money from colleges and universities.
via Trump Threatens to Cut NPR’s Funding After Pompeo Meltdown – Mother Jones
Scotty from Marketing, as The Betoota Advocate dubs our Schlockmeister of spin, is busier than a one-eyed cat watching two rat-holes. The parliamentary year from hell awaits. After his “miracle victory” pitch, an upset helped hugely by political cane toad, Clive Palmer, and his gift of sixty million dollars of anti-Labor negative advertising plus Scotty’s own campaign of outright lies about Opposition policy and endless defamatory attacks on Bill Shorten’s character, Scotty’s political future is already in extremis.
“PR is the place people end up when all other professional options fail, writer and lawyer Richard Ackland, unerringly, observes, “and now Schmo has failed at the failures’ last resort.”
I knew a toddler once who used to write on his bedroom wall with his own faeces. There’s a future for him with the Murdochracy, I think. (MC)
The Vermont senator is now the first choice of 25% of voters, the New York Times/Siena College survey found, an increase of six points from a similar poll taken in October.
A drop in popularity of Elizabeth Warren, the Massachusetts senator, from 22% to 15% accounts for Sanders’ boosted standing, with Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, and former vice-president Joe Biden stagnant in second and third place respectively with 18 and 17%.
Sanders, 78, has been “consolidating support from liberals and benefiting from divisions among more moderate presidential candidates who are clustered behind him”, the New York Times article accompanying the poll data claimed.
via Bernie Sanders surges in Iowa poll ahead of caucuses | US news | The Guardian
A full, 80-minute video of President Donald Trump calling for the ambassador of Ukraine to be booted out of her post was released by PBS News on Saturday.
A portion of the recording shows Trump in frame of the video, which was filmed at a private dinner on April 30, 2018, PBS reported. The recording also picked up Trump telling his associates to “get rid” of then-Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch, adding that they needed to “take her out.”
The release of the video recording confirms that Trump indeed called for Yovanovitch’s ouster, as suggested by reports from ABC News and MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow on Friday.
Watch The Full Video Of Trump Ordering For Marie Yovanovitch’s Ouster | HuffPost Australia
Donald Trump Has Been A Strong Witness Against Himself
Trump the Hero of the Middle East (ODT)
via Tens of Thousands of Iraqis mass in Baghdad to Demand Expulsion of US Troops, Hang Trump in Effigy
But most of all, I hate being lied to.
So no, I don’t feel proud today. I feel angry at how a great country is being destroyed by political hacks whose only goal is to keep their nose in the trough.
What mattered, in that it was useful for electoral purposes, is that stigmatising a minority community may gain votes. Race-baiting and dog-whistling are where Australian politics comes from. It has been so for a long time. Whether it was the original invaders treating Indigenous People like value-less fauna, and later on like ‘savages’; the enactment of the Influx of Chinese Restriction Act enacted in New South Wales in 1881, followed in time by other jurisdictions, because of ‘moral panic’ over Chinese miners; the discrimination against Irish because of the ignorant assumption that they were all Catholics and thus potential fifth-columnists; the internment of Germans as ‘enemy aliens’ during the first world war, and of German, Italian and Japanese ‘enemy aliens’ during the second world war; the mind-twisting obsession with ‘Asian crime gangs’ in the 1980s; or the anti-Lebanese and anti-Muslim sentiment which fuelled the Cronulla riots in late 2005, and the present Islamophobia fuelled by another ignorant, Pauline Hanson and her followers and imitators, Australia has wasted most of its historical efforts demonising one group or another.
But there is no improvement on the horizon, and not for want of trying.
via Comedy without art (part 6) – » The Australian Independent Media Network
Given people’s unhappiness, I thought I’d give you my own list.
It’s true Australia is responsible for about 1.2 per cent of global emissions. It’s also true that we contribute a quarter of exports that make up the world’s coal trade and just became the biggest gas exporter.
So what effect does the action we take on climate change within Australia have on cutting emissions? What is our part in solving a problem that is, by its nature, global?
via Australia emits 1.2 per cent of the world’s greenhouse gases. So who must act to cut emissions?
As per an analysis by FiveThirtyEight.com, the 3.5% unemployment figure is misleading; only about half of all employable Americans are working full time, 10% are working part time, 2.1% are actively seeking work but are unemployed, and 1.8% are not seeking work but want a job. A whopping 35% are out of the job market and not actively seeking work.
via Trump’s Rosy Economic Outlook Is a Big Lie | The Smirking Chimp
An audio recording reviewed by ABC News captured President Donald Trump demanding the ouster of then-U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Marie Yovanovitch during a 2018 dinner with a group of associates that included Lev Parnas, the indicted businessman Trump has repeatedly claimed not to know.
We should challenge climate deniers on every opportunity, not by providing them with factual information, we have tried that, but by challenging their motives, their unwillingness to change, their prejudices and unreasonableness, their intellectual laziness, their lack of credentials, their bias, lack of substance and their lack of caring. We should call them for what they are – future thieves and environmental vandals who are committing crimes against humanity. If you think this is harsh, just remember history show us it is unreasonable people who usually kill off the reasonable. We are reaching the end of the road to salvation and climate deniers are blocking the way forward.
via Future thieves are beyond reason – » The Australian Independent Media Network
“We need a serious debate in this country on issues,” Sanders said. “We don’t need to demonize people who may disagree with us. … I appeal to my supporters: Please, engage in civil discourse.” He pointed out (rightly) that “we’re not the only campaign that does it. Other people act that way as well.” But he added, “I would appeal to everybody: Have a debate on the issues. We can disagree with each other without being disagreeable, without being hateful.”
The Saving of Trump’s Privates (ODT)
Impeachment in Wonderland: First the Trial, Then the Evidence. | The Smirking Chimp
Forty-two percent is a terrifying number, because it’s about more than Trump. That number represents the percentage of Americans who have, it appears, wholly rejected reasoned discourse and democratic values. Due to the quirks in our electoral system that give disproportionate power to rural and suburban areas, and due to voter suppression efforts from the GOP, that 42% will likely control the Senate for the foreseeable future and will quite possibly win the presidency again in 2020.
via Impeachment trial should remove any lingering doubt: Republicans are beyond redemption | Salon.com
First
I’m, of course, talking about the recent bushfires. Just to recap the main talking points:
The bushfires, while bad, are nothing new because we’ve always had them.
These bushfires are not unprecedented. We’ve had worse.
They should not be politicised by talking about climate change.
They are the result of “greenie” influence and a lack of fuel reduction burns.
They are unprecedented because, in the past, we used to do fuel reduction burning.
They are not the result of climate change because a hotter climate doesn’t cause fires.
Don’t talk about climate change and try to politicise the issue.
Have we mentioned arson?
It’s all the states’ fault for not doing fuel reduction burning because that used to enable the fires to be put out before they’d got out of control.
We’ve always had droughts and fires and floods, so this is nothing new.
Of course, we believe in climate change, but, of course, some people will want more evidence before we do anything like… well, before we do anything.
Who is Matt Kean and why should we listen to someone who’s NSW Environment Minister?So in spite of the clear signals that Scott Morrison is considering that he’s prepared to change Coalition policy on climate change as long as it doesn’t involve anything which will affect jobs… In particular, his job. And so long as somebody can guarantee that this action won’t affect the Surplus, coal exports and ensure that his daughters get to ride on a unicorn, then he’s prepared to take it to the party room.
Then there’s Twiggy
