A former Nationals MP who quit the party because of its opposition to an Indigenous voice to parliament says sceptics will be proven wrong about the proposal.
Source: Ex-Nationals MP calls on voice ‘sceptics’ to open minds – Michael West
Hawke promised to rid us of child poverty but then we have had 20 years plus of the LNP
The insanity of all this defies logic. We can see venal capitalism making obscene individual profits for a tiny handful. We see governments, at the behest of the United States, spending unimaginable millions on weaponry that will make us all that little less secure and we have a generation of our youth, being cast adrift for the sake of what amounts to small change.
Source: Child poverty, $3.5 billion for tanks, and a government that does not care – Pearls and Irritations
The Big Four banks are hurtling to a record $33bn profit this year fired by $13bn in risk free Pandemic aid. Callum Foote checks out the latest profits for Westpac, NAB, CBA and ANZ – and the TFF effect.
Source: Banks hurtle to record profits turbocharged by Reserve Bank pandemic help – Michael West
It seems we’re going to be needing a lot more clever kids like Akash Shendure to keep the kajillionaires honest—and the rest of us on our toes.
Source: Billionaire Beware: This 17-Year-Old Is Tracking Your Carbon Emissions – Mother Jones
A court decision last week green lights bold defamation action against the English-speaking world’s most powerful media empire, as Alan Austin reports.
Source: Companies chasing billions from Fox News for ‘malicious’ election lies
Members of the UN Security Council issued a rare joint statement on Monday condemning a series of recent Israeli settlement expansion announcements, after the US managed to convince members to withdraw a more forceful resolution on the matter.
This week, in the portion of the Georgia grand jury report that was released by Judge McBurney, we learned that the grand jury suspects that multiple witnesses perjured themselves while giving testimony.There is one thing I can assure you about grand juries and the prosecutors who run them: they hate, and I mean hate being lied to. A grand jury can tell when lies have been told because they listen to the testimony of multiple witnesses and have access to all the documentary evidence, and they can compare one person’s testimony with the testimony of others questioned about the same subjects.
Source: A cover-up fit for a coup: Georgia grand jury says witnesses in Trump probe lied | Salon.com
A trove of newly-released text messages and emails have laid bare how the right-wing media giant operated with little regard for fact in the weeks and months following the 2020 presidential election. The correspondence reveals that the network’s senior-most executives and highest-profile hosts chose not to disclose what they believed to be the truth of the election out of fear that that the facts would alienate Fox News’ audience and throw the highly profitable business into ruin.
Say what you will about Peter Dutton, he is a truly terrible person.
So Canada, NZ, and South Africa are all Apartheid Nations according to Australians who refuse Indigenous recognition. Indigenous Australians were the first people here and were simply overrun, killed, enslaved, and regarded as worthless fauna. They weren’t Invaders, settlers, or colonisers. They weren’t immigrants. They were the people of this land. Recognition of that fact is a common element of all other Colonized nations on the planet except in Australia. Just as recognition of Climate change is common to most of the world’s nations except for Australia. Why is that?
What these exceptions have in common and the rest of the world doesn’t is the LNP is the antithesis to what the general population of Australia thinks. They alone are the cause of division in our Democracy, not multicultural diversity along with an economic class divide.. It is the LNP which prefers to divide rather than unite us as it serves them and the minority they represent well politically. Their ideal is of course cultural assimilation which they readily define by pointing out the differences between them and us. Culture, Color, and Religion are basic triggers of hate and Peter Dutton has never been shy to point out those that don’t belong.
The fatuous attempts to depict a simple, straightforward Voice to Parliament as analogous to apartheid is divisive scaremongering at best, or a clear rejection – yet again – of the presence and participation of First Nations Peoples in our society, at worst. And a rejection of recognition of the original inhabitants of this land from its primary founding document, is a vote for their continued exclusion based on race. And that, Senator Hanson, is apartheid.
Anyway, the amazing Senator Reynolds has said that she was the victim of a “hit job” by her political opponents because of what she did or didn’t do with regard to the alleged incident. She also told us something that I found strange which was:
“I haven’t been able to speak for the last two years…”
Source: The Amazing Linda Reynolds… – » The Australian Independent Media Network
I’M SURE there will be beers all around for the Westpac communications team who managed to flip the bird at six federal senators this week and pull off one of the most stunning public relations subterfuges I’ve witnessed.
Source: Westpac closes regional bank, despite pledges to the contrary
Since the late 1970s, strike action and union membership have been declining steadily in most Western democracies. New research finds that one key reason is the working class’s increasing dependence on credit.
The good news for the Murdoch media is that it’s not the most distrusted brand in Australia – despite the efforts of its journalists.
The bad news is that – according to the Roy Morgan Research Most Trusted and Distrusted Brands research – it is the fifth most distrusted behind Facebook, Optus, Telstra and Amazon. It just edges out Harvey Norman, whose ads in newspapers provoke much irritation, which rated sixth.
There are probably many reasons for the rating but the main ones are probably its unrelenting attacks on anything vaguely progressive; its rabid commentators; and, it is attempts to re-frame any debate so as to favour the LNP, attack the ALP and wage war on the woke.
Calling for Australia’s ABC
Nonpartisan, publicly funded media is “an idea that we should explore,” said the senator.
Source: Sanders Proposes ‘New Deal for Journalism’ to Ensure Media Serves Public Interest
A trove of newly-released text messages and emails have laid bare how the right-wing media giant operated with little regard for fact in the weeks and months following the 2020 presidential election. The correspondence reveals that the network’s senior-most executives and highest-profile hosts chose not to disclose what they believed to be the truth of the election out of fear that that the facts would alienate Fox News’ audience and throw the highly profitable business into ruin.
Analysis: Fox News has been exposed as a dishonest organization terrified of its own audience.
For Republican Party elected officials and leaders, it’s time to stop being the nits at the poker table. Trump no longer holds the cards. His bluffing days should be over.
The higher the world’s central banks lift interest rates, and the more they risk pushing us into recession, the more our smarter economists are thinking there has to be a better way to control inflation.
Source: Inflation is too tricky to be left to the Reserve Bank
Up to 30 partners and staff were involved in sharing confidential government tax policy, Senate estimates was told.
Source: PwC Peter Collins leak: Scandal involved up to 30 partners and staff, estimates told
Murdoch media has a documented history of hacking the private lives of people it believes it can profit from. It’s closure of The News of the World, employees jailed, and Murdoch being grilled in the UK are proof that the Murdochs have maintained their unethical practices. It seems the organization has maintained hacking as a tool by which it gathers information to help those like Linda Reynolds. It’s hard to imagine it was Linda Reynolds who provided the information that was published in the Australian?
The Weekend Australian referred to the former political staffer’s diary contents in an interview with her ex-boss Senator Linda Reynolds on Saturday.
Responding to the article, Ms Higgins said it was the third time The Australian had published “private images, texts and WhatsApps from my phone”.
Interesting how people who claim to be against government interference are all for it when it serves their preference. “I’m tired of ‘woke'” is meant to stop conversation. There’s no engagement, like “That’s not exactly how that happened.” It’s anti-engagement, like so much of today’s rhetoric.
Why so afraid to engage? Afraid you might LOSE?
Maybe because when people try engage in absurd talking points it becomes so damn obvious those talking points are not only wrong, but the wrong headed. Talking point: “Blacks had slaves too!” Response: “So? And your point is…?” Citing African “history” makes nothing right, defends nothing. It’s like saying, “Hey, that guy over there murdered someone too,” hoping to get another discussion of murder off the table. Intentional distraction. A classic case of “Look over THERE instead!”
If slavery is wrong it’s wrong: another example doesn’t make it right.
Source: Inspection- Of “Woke,” Anti-Woke and the Anti-Culture War | The Smirking Chimp
Privatisation is the systemised scourge of enslavement of life on this planet for the benefit of the minority
The Sydney public hospital now controlled in the Cayman Islands is not subject to penalties for healthcare failures. Michael West reports on calls for a public inquiry into the privatisation and performance of Northern Beaches Hospital.
In his first major international interview since returning to power, Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke to CNN earlier this month. He demonstrated that he is still a prolific liar misleading the public very deliberately about various policy issues.
What the Murdoch’s claim to be “news” almost had Rupert jailed in the UK. He sacrificed a paper and staff then fled to the US to repeat his methods and there.
In 2020, Fox News anchors Tucker Carlson and Sean Hannity pushed Donald Trump’s election fraud claims for weeks. New documents suggest they never believed any of it.
Source: Fox News Knew Donald Trump’s Election Fraud Claims Were False. They Broadcast Them Anyway.
Message to The LNP
Australia has no formal recognition of government and religion. Would you approve or disapprove of a constitutional amendment to formally separate government and religion?
Australia wide, around 53 per cent were in favour of a constitutional amendment to separate government and religion federally, 13 per cent were opposed and 33 per cent didn’t know.
Lind Reynolds and Scott Morrison sing from the same hymn book
In a four-hour interview with The Weekend Australian, Senator Reynolds claimed to be the victim of a “political hit job” designed to bring down both her and the former Morrison government.
Source: Linda Reynolds breaks two-year silence on Higgins rape scandal
A nation of critical thinkers would, from the perspective of citizen loyalty, be a dangerous thing, writes Lawrence Davidson.
Top Fox News executives and hosts privately trashed the false election claims they aired but worried that fact-checking TrumpWorld’s lies would hurt their “stock price” and anger former President Donald Trump, according to texts and emails cited in a bombshell court filing by Dominion Voting Systems, which filed a $1.6 billion defamation lawsuit against the network.
Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The Thwaites Glacier in Antarctica is in the news again. We are fascinated with it because it is the Godzilla of glaciers, 80 miles across and as massive as Florida. If the ice sheet holding it back were to melt, and if Thwaites plopped into the ocean, it would all by itself raise sea level two feet. It functions, however, to hold back other glaciers and ice formations, which in its absence would themselves head for the sea. If that happened you would be talking about ten feet of sea level rise. The last time
Source: More Evidence that the Massive Thwaites Glacier is Melting Fast, Threatening the world’s Coasts
Do-Nothing but talk Morrison is giving speeches praising himself on how he called out China on human rights issues. Yes, he’s demanding sanctions he never applied himself. Morrison only ever opens his mouth to praise himself and the things he never did.
Australia must step up its pressure on China over human rights abuses Scott Morrison has said while praising his efforts to call out “bullying” by Beijing.
Source: Morrison calls for China sanctions, praises his efforts – Michael West
Reducing the risk of Australia becoming trapped in an American war in Asia, again, requires the Australian government to give notice now to the United States that it wishes to withdraw from the FPA.
Source: The Abdication of Australian Sovereignty to the US – Pearls and Irritations
the issue is serious.
It’s not just about wasting money, as Defence has so often done in the past. It’s now very much about making sure we can deter conflict, and deal with it if deterrence fails. When it all goes bad you take what you’ve got to the fight, and a handful of contracts with blown schedules and budgets are not much of a weapon.
Source: Rex Patrick: as US-China tensions rise Australia remains pitifully unprepared for war – Michael West
This ingloriously subservient status to Washington has been laid bare yet again, and along with that, the increasingly likely prospect of being targeted in any future conflict that involves the United States. Hardly a responsible state of affairs, and one on the verge of being treasonous.
Pure evil is that Tory accomplice, the scrotum-headed media magnate and his willing flunkies who not only know the truth but promote the lies regardless. There is no hell hot enough for Rupert Murdoch and his flying monkeys. There is no stretch in chokey long enough for the Tudges, Porters and Roberts of the Lying Nasty Party.
Source: An appetite for evil – » The Australian Independent Media Network
It’s no surprise that Jim Chalmers’ gentle challenge to neoliberal economics has generated an often rabid and intensely hostile response from the Murdoch media. To be hoped for is a more reasoned, informed national debate which focusses on, as Chalmers points to, fundamental changes to our economic environment.
Source: Jim Chalmers’ new economics: a frontal assault on capitalism? – Pearls and Irritations
Is this another case of hippies yet again, having found another way, another substance, who are now getting run over by Big Pharma and Capitalism because if rebranded leads down a yellow brick road made of money? Is this the start of a another new wave once exclusive to Dr Feel Good’s ticket to a magical mystery tour?
Weed is being legalised or at least decriminalised. So much of what was once declared evil is now being rinsed and cleansed again. Will we see coke put back into Coca Cola? Coca Cola wishes it would I’m sure.
Just a flip and systemic relabelling and what was pure evil becomes a medicinal godsend to be paid for at far far far higher prices. Insulin is almost beyond the reach of diabetics in the USA. Smuggled in from Canada because there it’s on the National Health program. Get to Cuba and its almost free. It amplifies the difference in degree between the values of three different economic systems and their goals because in the USA the price is only affordable to the rich and connected.
Welcomed by many in the medical community, the Federal Government recently announced the rescheduling of MDMA and psilocybin for treating PTSD and treatment-resistant depression, writes David McIlveen.
Newly released filing in defamation lawsuit shows the full extent of how Fox lied about Dominion and dishonestly pushed the “Big Lie” after the 2020 election
Murdoch is an Advertorial
In the latest escalation in Australia’s increasingly forceful campaign to manufacture consent for war with China, the Murdoch-owned Sky News Australia has aired a jaw-droppingly propagandistic hour-long special which advocates a dramatic increase in the nation’s military spending.
Merger mania exists among the Military suppliers along with their power to influence policy.
Last November, the Department of Defense once again failed to pass even a basic audit, as it had several times before. In fact, independent auditors weren’t even able to assess the Pentagon’s full financial picture because they couldn’t gather all the necessary information to complete an evaluation. In some ways, that should have been devastating, the equivalent of a child receiving an incomplete on an end-of-year report card. No less alarming, the Pentagon couldn’t even account for about 61% of its $3.5 trillion in assets. Yet the last Congress still approved $858 billion in defense programs for fiscal year 2023, a full $45 billion more than even the Biden administration requested.
Source: Merger Mania in the Military-Industrial Complex – CounterPunch.org
Human Rights Abuse, Australia denies it’s own and Israel’s but accuses China.
Palestinian prisoners can be left in grim conditions in Israel’s prisons for years, without charge or trial — just one part of the repression they endure daily.
Billionaires prefer to lurk in the shadows
Pennsylvania billionaire and Republican megadonor Jeffrey Yass is a key benefactor behind both the Moderate PAC, which fights progressive primary challengers in the United States, and the Kohelet Policy Forum, which is working to reshape the political system in Israel.
Source: GOP Megadonor Is Funding Far-Right Israeli Think Tank — and Democrats
Israel is being pressed from within by
It is home to almost one million Russian-speaking citizens, one-third of whom arrived from Ukraine shortly before and immediately following the collapse of the Soviet Union. “The Russian attack on Ukraine is a serious violation of the international order,” said Lapid. “Israel condemns this attack.”
The future will reveal even more about Israel’s role in the Russia-Ukraine war. However, what is quite clear for now is that it is no longer a neutral party, even if the government in Tel Aviv continues to repeat such claims.
Whitlam changed Australia and Fraser stole the benefits that followed but divided the nation like nobody before him. Hawke and Keating repaired that damage done, and made us part of South East Asian, a Pacific Nation. John Howard put an end to that and went on a spending spree and witch hunt for Asylum seekers. Rudd and Gillard saved the nation from the global shocks of the GFC with Wayne Swan being voted the world’s best treasurer and economic manager. Do you notice a pattern?
The past decade saw the Abbott/Turnbull/Morrison LNP put an end to worrying about spending and took the nation’s debt to x3 times higher than ever before almost a Trillion dollars. The common thread in all of this has been the ALP is always being handed the LNP’s poisoned chalice of economic mismanagement and a new set of divisive set of culture wars. A revised set of fake identity politics, to hate in order to hide their economic malfeasance. After which they hand back government to the ALP to fix while calling them incompetent fuckwits from the bleachers of the opposition. The rich can afford to pay the price for their malpractice while the middle class shrink the poor expand and the majority of this nation suffer. Each cycle they find it harder to recover from the ever-expanding income and wealth gap. Their children’s expectations lessened and lessened by debt and false promises of opportunity
Tough times are ahead for the Albanese government this year, but how tough? The opposition’s strategy runs along the following lines. The economic slowdown caused by rises in the cash rate will smash the government’s financial credentials, with Anthony Albanese and Jim Chalmers in the frame to be blamed squarely for all of it, along with every price rise that comes along. The opposition’s mantra is already “why is everything dearer under Labor?”
Source: Federal politics: Labor Party under Anthony Albanese faces tough road ahead
The CSIRO’s recent report detailing carbon credits required to offset gas fracking in the Beetaloo Basin is based on faulty assumptions to suit the gas industry, say experts. Callum Foote reports.
Australia must not allow our politicians and “thought” leaders on the right to push us down the destructive path being pursued by the Republicans.
The American right is waging war on modernity. The radicalised right alliance is sacrificing empirical evidence and truth for theocracy, tribal games and lies. It is determined to reverse the achievements of the Civil Rights era: white Christian man will return to his rightful place as delineator of truth. The contingent is destroying America’s standing to achieve it.
olddogthoughts 
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