When the Democrats are little better than the Republicans what does it say about American Democracy?
Man Examining Fake News On Newspaper Through Magnifying Glass A group of top US agents, mostly Democrats, pumped hundreds of fake news stories into the mainstream media, it was revealed at the weekend.
Source: Leak confirms U.S. agents created massive ‘Kremlin web-bots’ scam – Pearls and Irritations
“I respectfully decline to answer the questions under the rights and privileges afforded to every citizen under the United States Constitution — This will be my answer to any further questions.”
People take the Fifth Amendment so they don’t incriminate themselves. It IS the right of every American. However, when it was Hillary’s computer programmer, Trump claimed taking the fifth was an admission of guilt.
Trump repeatedly said “same answer” to speed things up. CBS reported that, “Trump did so more than 400 times during the course of the full interview, according to sources.”
That’s a far cry from when he attacked Hillary Clinton and declared anyone taking the Fifth must be guilty.
“The mob takes the Fifth,” he said at an Iowa campaign rally in September. “If you’re innocent, why are you taking the Fifth Amendment?”
Source: Trump Takes ‘The Fifth’ In NY Fraud Probe Deposition | Crooks and Liars
There’s a cult-like feel to today’s Liberal Party, with too many of its MPs meekly following their leader. As the electorate swings to the left, Peter Dutton continues to look to the right – it won’t win back the voters they lost.
It was never the subject of a formal announcement but at some stage in the past few years, the Liberal Party at the federal level seems to have ceased to be a conventional political organisation.
Source: Dutton is driving the Liberals off a cliff – and his colleagues are passengers watching on
The Prime Minister’s commitment to implement the Uluru Statement From the Heart in full is in grave danger of being derailed by the shorthand title, ‘The Voice’ that we keep hearing about.
Source: Paul Bongiorno: ‘No’ campaign spoiling to muffle the Voice
Andrew Bolt clings to the IPA like a leech for their intellectual narratives
For the IPA, the history of settlement and dispossession, however lamentable, forms no part of the referendum proposition on the table. For them, the present disadvantage of Indigenous Australians, again however lamentable, owes more to the way that Indigenous Australians have allowed themselves to become pauperised and impoverished by welfare systems, and encouraged to think of themselves as helpless victims rather than actors in their own personal advancement. They want to persuade people that rights and assistance should be stripped away, arguing, that “woke” policies and government interventions, however well intentioned, have not improved their situation and generally have made it worse. For them, only policies based on personal responsibility, providing individual rather than collective rights and rewards for work, will create the wealth, human, social and economic capital, and incentives to lift people from their misery. The inequality, and material and spiritual poverty of the US is a testament to the truth of their gospel. Depriving the IPA and their sponsors of their special privileges and advantages, and their access to the power they enjoy should be one of the more com
Source: Voice vote may demand blood in the water – Pearls and Irritations
Pressure is mounting for the Albanese Government to end the Coalition’s legacy of neoliberalism and take steps towards wealth equality, writes Bilal Cleland.
Source: Taxing the super-rich a good start to ending wealth inequality
On Saturday evening and Sunday, the Israeli-Occupied Palestinian West Bank descended into an orgy of violence on the part of militant Israeli squatters on private Palestinian land, with the Palestine Authority recording 144 squatter attacks, according to Kamil Ibrahim, reporting from Jerusalem for al-Ra’i.
Chris Hedges: Ukraine: The War That Went Wrong NATO support for the war in Ukraine, designed to degrade the Russian military and drive Vladimir Putin from power, is not going according to plan. The new sophisticated military hardware won’t help.
Source: Chris Hedges: Ukraine: The War That Went Wrong – scheerpost.com
‘Questions which relate to the whole body of the people, to the purity of race, to the preservation of the racial character of the white population, are Commonwealth questions and should be so exclusively’.
Australia has a racist constitution. It gives the Federal Parliament power to make laws for ‘The people of any race, for whom it is deemed necessary to make special laws’. Deemed necessary, that is, by the Parliament itself.
Given the failure of the Morrison and earlier governments to improve Aboriginal welfare (‘Closing the Gap’ remains merely an aspiration) this is not a particularly appealing response. But the fact that Dutton keeps raising questions about the voice designed, it appears, to sabotage the referendum, suggest he will either avoid committing his party either way, or else reluctantly advocate a ‘yes’ vote, so that if the referendum fails he can blame the government’s strategy, tactics and general ineptitude.
We are in for an unedifying six or more months until we get to vote.
Source: Australia’s racist Constitution and the Voice – Pearls and Irritations
The first thing Abbott did when elected was rid the ATO of some 3000 fully trained corporate tax investigators the best were snapped up by the big 4
Big 4 consultancy PwC has been caught red-handed with partners leaking confidential information, obtained while advising the Federal government on combating tax avoidance, so their multinational clients could avoid tax. As the government ponders its response, Rex Patrick argues it’s time to introduce a procurement blacklist to deal with corporate cowboys.
Source: Rex Patrick: put PwC top of blacklist for government procurement payments – Michael West
The Albanese Government has acted promptly to begin the process of restoring Australia’s reputation in the region, as Alan Austin reports.
Source: Australia’s renewed commitment to neighbourliness is saving lives
When Common Sense no longer exist individual interests prevail.
To put it bluntly, soon Russia will be in a position where a single ship could, in a matter of minutes, fire 16 nuclear armed hypersonic missiles at the United States which not only cannot be intercepted by anything in the US arsenal, but also would impact their respective targets before any meaningful evacuation could be conducted. It is, literally, a decapitation weapon. Current Russian nuclear doctrine does not allow for a nuclear first strike; indeed, Russian President Vladimir Putin has made it clear that Russia would not be the first nation to use nuclear weapons in any future nuclear conflict. But he also emphasized that Russia would not be the second, either, meaning that Russia would release its nuclear arsenal without waiting for any US first strike to impact Russian soil.
If the Islamic Jihad cell had been planning an attack, as the Israelis maintained, then the raid was not illegal in itself. But it left so many dead bodies behind aside from the those of the three militants, not to mention injured, that the commando tactics appear to have shown reckless disregard for civilian, non-combatant life, which is a war crime.
We will see many more raids involving reckless disregard for human life in the West Bank now that Israeli extremists have been put in charge of 3 million Palestinians. It is as though a grand wizard of the Ku Klux Klan in the U.S. had been made Secretary of the Interior with oversight of native Americans.
PM Netanyahu announced that he would meet the challenge of increased violence by issuing Israelis (including the Israeli squatters on Palestinian private property in the West Bank) more guns. He said he would also try to collect ‘illegal weapons.’ That is, the Israelis are heavily armed but the Palestinians helpless. Squatter attacks on Palestinians help account for the high death toll of the past thirteen months.
Source: Netanyahu Proposes More Guns to Solve Israeli-Palestinian Violence as Tit-for-Tat Attacks Multiply
Collective Punishment is an instrument of a number of fascist regimes throughout history. Israel is in complete denial that it belongs on such a notable list. However, it’s a practice once condemned by Jews in the past and is now common practice of a State that claims to represent them.
Israel has sealed the home of an east Jerusalem man who killed seven people outside a synagogue, in a preliminary step ahead of the expected demolition of the building, as two Palestinian men died from Israeli fire. Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s Cabinet approved an order to seal the home of a second Palestinian shooter — a 13-year-old boy who wounded two Israeli men in east Jerusalem on Saturday. His Cabinet also took steps toward approving other punitive measures against the families of Palestinian attackers, including potentially stripping them of citizenship rights and deporting them.
Friedman urged US President Joe Biden to “save Israel” from becoming a bastion of zealotry. “Israel is on the verge of a historic transformation — from a full-fledged democracy to something less, and from a stabilising force in the region to a destabilising one,” said Friedman. “Can Joe Biden save Israel?” he asked, with the looming possibility of it turning into an “illiberal bastion of zealotry”. In December Friedman wrote another piece in the NYT under the headline “The Israel We Knew Is Gone”. In another column he asked, “What in the World Is Happening in Israel?”
Source: Thomas Friedman shows that liberal Jews have no Reason left to defend Israel
In September 2020, George Santos’ congressional campaign reported that Victoria and Jonathan Regor had each contributed $2,800—the maximum amount—to his first bid for a House seat. Their listed address was 45 New Mexico Street in Jackson Township, New Jersey.
A search of various databases reveals no one in the United States named Victoria or Jonathan Regor. Moreover, there is nobody by any name living at 45 New Mexico Street in Jackson. That address doesn’t exist. There is a New Mexico Street in Jackson, but the numbers end in the 20s, according to Google Maps and a resident of the street.
Antitrust laws were enacted more than a century ago to protect our democracy from being undermined by giant corporations. Yet this what Twitter and Meta are now doing. In my view, we should reduce the size and reach of these huge corporate megaphones by using antitrust laws to break them up.
Source: Should Trump Get Back His Giant Megaphones? | The Smirking Chimp
The most publicly derided acquisition in modern Australian art history has proved to be one of the nation’s bargains of the century.
Jackson Pollock’s Blue poles is now worth a whopping $500 million, according to a new valuation by its keeper, the National Gallery of Australia.
One of Rupert and Lachlan Murdoch’s defences from any personal liability in the court cases is that in their management roles, they do not tell journalists what to say.
But in the below video, Lachlan Murdoch says that he “works closely with the managers of those newsrooms and it’s important they get the positioning and the messaging right”. Those “managers” would be the editors who work directly with the journalists overseeing what the journalists write. So Lachlan by his own admission is only one step away from directly telling the journalists what to write.
Rest assured “collective punishment” is coming to all Palestinians. It’s the Israeli way, Just as the Germans did during WW2 if an individual Palestinian commits a crime all Palestinians get punished.
“We grieve for all this unthinkable loss. And with our grief, we also rage,” said Jewish Voice for Peace. “The Israeli government’s domination and oppression of Palestinians is the root cause of each of these senseless, tragic deaths.”
Source: Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community | Common Dreams
In a new CNN poll released today, 73% of all Americans say that House Republicans do not have the right priorities for Americans.
Source: CNN Poll: 73% Say House Republicans Don’t Have The Right Priorities | Crooks and Liars
Ron DeSantis’s crusade against “woke ideology” was always a thinly disguised assault on the rights of Florida teachers and their unions. His recent “Teacher’s Bill of Rights” only makes it explicit.
Source: Ron DeSantis Prefers to Call His War on Workers a War on “Wokeness”
“Pearson said detail would be in legislation made by the parliament but the referendum was about the constitution.
“It’s the parliamentarians who have the responsibility to come up with the detail,” he told ABC Radio.
“The Australian people are being asked to vote on a constitutional amendment. All of the power lies with the parliament and it’s a complete diversion to demand these details.”…
Australians deserve an independent ABC. Not one that purposely mirrors other often politically compromised reporting, like Murdoch media, to avoid “left-wing” labels, writes Dr Victoria Fielding.
Source: Politicised attacks are damaging the ABC’s editorial independence
Liberal senator Linda Reynolds is suing Brittany Higgins’s partner over tweets he made that she alleges defamed her.
Ms Higgins was working in Ms Reynolds’ Canberra Ministerial office when she was allegedly raped by a colleague.
Subsequent legal proceedings against the accused were abandoned in October and then a planned retrial was dropped by the prosecution.
In fresh court documents lodged in Western Australia’s Supreme Court, Ms Reynolds has accused Mr Higgins’s partner, David Sharaz, of defaming her in two tweets from the account @SharazDavid in January and December last year.
In the writ issued through her lawyer, Martin Bennett, Ms Reynolds alleged the tweets were “falsely defamatory” and thereby caused her “loss and damage”.
The Perth-based senator is demanding Mr Sharaz pay aggravated damages and interest at a rate of 6 per cent since they were published.
Source: Linda Reynolds launches defamation action against Brittany Higgins’s partner David Sharaz – ABC News
Editor’s Note: both Shine Justice and PwC were provided with detailed questions for this story. They declined to be respond. The author of the Shine investment report on which this story is based preferred to remain anonymous.
Being a law firm, Shine’s directors and executives would understand that the Corporations Act requires them to comply with Australian Accounting Standards (AASB). Auditor PwC would also be aware of this. Questions were put to Shine and PwC for this story but there was no response. An offer to meet to discuss the red flags covered by the investment report was also ignored.
Source: Red flags abound for Shine Justice but “no win no fee” law firm no respond, nor PwC – Michael West
Its your pocket that’s being picked
Who doesn’t want an extra hundred bucks in their pocket each month, right? Yet Australians are on average throwing away at least that much by paying for subscriptions they’ve either forgotten about or no longer use.
Source: Forgotten subscriptions costing billions – Michael West
In bloody carnage on Thursday morning, Israeli occupation forces assaulted Jenin refugee camp killing nine Palestinians, including two children and a 61-year-old woman, and injuring dozens more.
Source: Israeli bloodbath in Jenin kills 9 Palestinians | The Electronic Intifada
Israel’s intention is to provoke an all-out war so it can invade the West Bank and annex it as part of the State of Israel.
The new government of Israel under the leadership of Binyamin Netanyahu, which includes the fascist Religious Zionism and Jewish Power blocs, has begun chasing away businesses and investors, has provoked hundreds of thousands of Israelis to protest, and has led to an end of security cooperation with the Palestinian Authority, a legacy of the 1993 Oslo Peace Accords, which are now a dead letter.
Putin’s Liberation Mariupol in Pictures
How has the battle-scarred Ukrainian city of Mariupol changed after eight months under Russian control? These images were taken by photojournalist Arseniy Kotov half a year apart, in summer and in winter, and show efforts to restore the Azov sea pearl It’s now over eight months since Mariupol – the second largest city of the Continue reading »
Source: Mariupol: the battle-scarred city – Pearls and Irritations
“I’m completely in favor of a Bay of Pigs operation to liberate that country,” Carlson said. “Why should we stand back and let our biggest trading partner, the country with which we share the longest border — a great country — why should we let it become Cuba?”
(Canada is not a communist country nor does it have any chance of being one.)
“Like, why don’t we liberate it? We’re spending all this money to liberate Ukraine from the Russians, why are we not sending an armed force north to liberate Canada from Trudeau, and I mean it?” Carlson chimed.
Source: Tucker Carlson Proposes The US Invade Canada To Liberate Them | Crooks and Liars
The controversial robodebt scheme would have been fundamentally changed or stopped altogether had independent legal advice been sought on the issue, a royal commission has been told.
The commission examining the Centrelink debt recovery scheme was told such independent advice would have “reputational damage” to the government and the departments administering the program.
Former Social Services principal legal officer Anna Fredericks told the commission that obtaining independent legal advice on the scheme was sought, but tensions between the Department of Social Services and the Department of Human Services prevented it from occurring.
“If independent legal advice had been sought at the time and had full scope and awareness of the program, I have no doubt they would have come to that view (of it being unlawful),” she said.
“It would have undoubtedly led to a redesign or cessation … it would have likely caused reputational damage to those two departments but also to the government.”
Source: Robodebt advice would cause damage: lawyer – Michael West
Santos is denying it, but local farmers on the pristine Liverpool Plains tell a different story. Santos is poised to start fracking in the Gunnedah Basin, Callum Foote reports.
Source: Santos edges in on fracking the Liverpool Plains despite repeated denials
Conclusions to the trials of both George Pell and Bruce Lehrmann have increased the public’s distrust in our legal system, writes Paul Begley.
Source: Pell and Lehrmann trial verdicts have shaken public confidence
A research report published in the US this week cites numerous concerns with Adani’s business structure, accounting practices and its lofty valuation. Echoing Enron – one of the most spectacular corporate failures in recent history – the report even questions how Adani makes money, if at all. What’s the scam?
Source: Is Adani the next Enron? What’s the scam? – Michael West
wit
Murdoch was caught red-handed illegally corrupting UK media. Let off by the Tories he fled the UK for America to do the same there, He’s trie and continues to do so in Australia for 47 years. But for the ABC, he has become the least trusted media maggot in the country. However, trusted news and information aren’t his primary business. Rating numbers are. Influence for the moneyed is. Cash and making it flow from the top down the business model. Win or lose doesn’t matter dependence does. Now, Ch9 has joined him in that chase along with Kerry Stokes. All vying to be lifes narrators to the masses for the wealthy and powerful
Fox News is after me again.
This is nothing new. Former Fox host Bill O’Reilly once accused me of being a communist (this was before O’Reilly was ousted after it was reported that he and Fox News paid five women $13 million to settle various sexual misconduct lawsuits).
10 deaths were reported including civilians while many more were severely injured. No Israelis were harmed it would seem. Reason for this IDF raid “IDF intelligence” so a “Special Operation” was required. However, no details or justification are ever given that could substantiate justification for the Israeli raid. The Palestinian Authority has broken off relations with the terrorist State of Israel yet again since they are just as confused. Will the IDF justify its actions in the new dramatic season of the TV series Fauda as a propaganda feast?
Washington has raised concern over the escalation in Israeli-Palestinian violence after Israeli forces on Thursday killed nine Palestinians during a West Bank raid in the deadliest single day in the territory in decades.
The recent election of the most rightwing government in Israeli history is expected to inflame an already volatile situation. Members of the new Israeli coalition have pledged to accelerate the building of Jewish settlements in the West Bank – a practice that negates the possibility of a two-state solution – and loosen the rules of engagement for soldiers and police.
The Ukrainian conflict has so far been a proxy war between Russia and NATO. However, the growing number of Western countries joining the conflict and aiming to “strategically defeat” Russia may lead to a direct clash between the Armed Forces of Russia and Western military units. If this happens, the Ukrainian conflict will turn into a Russia-NATO war. Such a situation will inevitably carry a nuclear risk. This is further aggravated by the fact that, acting out of desperation, Kiev authorities may provoke the US-led military bloc to directly enter the conflict.
Source: 2023 will be make-or-break year for Russia – Pearls and Irritations
An Indigenous Nation is a Multicultural Inclusive Nation. Anti- Multiculturalism is anti-Australian and merely a White Colony intruding on Indigenous lands. Be and reflect what you are Australia your not a White Nation and never have been.
The wisdom of the saints for us as individuals also pertains to us as a nation. Wisdom is that, every day, we should ask ourselves this question: “Am I becoming a more loving person?”. Changing the date of Australia Day and embracing the referendum are opportunities to be a more loving nation. The heart has its own wisdom.
Source: 26 January echoes with ‘torment’ of First Nation peoples’ ‘powerlessness’ – Pearls and Irritations
Conservatives rail against references to “invasion day”. Ultimately, however, these are the despairing sighs of an old, dying Australia which no longer exists and isn’t coming back.
It’s all about the numbers, Fake News continues to dominate REAL News and the ALP is just as much an ally as the LNP. In that regard, they are Trumpist-rating chasers. Murdoch destroyed News in the UK for ratings and when busted fled to the US. He destroyed News in the US and they live with the consequence today. He struggled in Australia because we had the ABC so he called on the LNP to dilute and weaken what was a bulwark to democracy that kept the bastards honest. With every successive LNP government that safety net to REAL trusted News and information has been broken.
(Image by Dan Jensen) Following the Coalition’s example, News Corp and Nine have been prioritised over small independent publishers in the Albanese Government’s “media roundtable” initiative. Michelle Pini reports.
Workers need a $7000 pay packet boost to keep up with the soaring cost of living.
Canstar analysis shows the average worker earning $92,030 would need a $7178 increase in annual income to keep pace with inflation, which rose 7.8 per cent annually in the December quarter.
We are at a crossroads. The Ultra High Net Worth Individual (UHNWI) class is creating a new international feudal order, assisted by the professional enabler class including politicians in pursuit of their money. One of those enabling mechanisms is the media. In Australia, News Corp serves as the strongest weapon in the creation of their desired world.
Source: Distracted by hate, we are robbed – » The Australian Independent Media Network
Hollywood blockbusters Fall Guy and Planet of the Apes are filming in Sydney, and sci-fi remake Metropolis in Melbourne – all at high public expense, subsidised by state and federal governments. Is it worth paying for Americans telling American stories? Or would the money be better spent on Australians telling Australian stories? Michael West follows the money.
It’s too early to know if there was any connection between Rupert Murdoch’s deposition in the Dominion case and days later pulling a massive plan to recombine News Corp. and Fox Corp., but the timing of this withdrawal is certainly interesting.
olddogthoughts 