Capitalism

Michael West Media – Byron Bay blue between “Airbnb mafia” and grassroots groups highlights costly housing crisis

Byron Bay blue spotlights tensions between “Airbnb mafia” and grassroots community groups

The market hasn’t “bounced back” it’s been manipulated. Technology has accelerated the corporate invasion of market sectors to plunder and take over areas where once many more middlemen grazed. Uber did it to the taxi industry, Airbnb the Real Estate management market, Amazon the retail industry and so on. Like the East India Company the first corporation, a modern management system can be run from a single office and is able to do what Atlassian did to the rapid registry of shares and even allowed Madoff to create the world’s biggest $64bill Ponzi scheme.

Yes, the global landscape is rapidly changing but not the Capitalist system and its value for the accumulation of private profit, time, and less labour. Where money makes money for those with a generational excess of it and already loaded. They are simply ready to continue investing their wealth rather than productive labour to exist. Labour today can cost less, be done by machines and if socially distributed provide less work and more leisure time for everyone rather than be a means of exploitation.

Pandemic lockdowns crushed Airbnb, Stayz and other short-term rental operators but the market has bounced back sharply, creating tensions in popular tourist destinations between councils, community groups and well-heeled property owners. Callum Foote reports on the case of ritzy Byron Bay.

Source: Michael West Media – investigative journalists – always independent

LNP

The Iraq war, Fallujah and Jim Molan – Pearls and Irritations

November 2004; Soliders with the Iraqi Special Forces attached with the Marines with 2nd Squad, 3rd Platoon, L Company, 3rd Battalion, 5th Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, A city street in Fallujah heavily damaged by the fighting, November 2004

The late Jim Molan will be remembered for many things. Few will remember him for the widespread violence by Coalition troops under Molan’s command during the brutal assault on Fallujah and other Sunni cities during the illegal occupation of Iraq in late 2004.

Source: The Iraq war, Fallujah and Jim Molan – Pearls and Irritations

Informed Comment

Nuclear Submarine Doubts: US Lawmakers and AUKUS – » The Australian Independent Media Network

The policymaking apparatus behind the AUKUS security pact was shoddy from the start. It has raised questions about the extent US power will subordinate Australia further in future conflicts; it has brought into question Australia’s own sovereignty; and it has also raised the spectre of regional nuclear proliferation via the use of otherwise closely guarded propulsion technology.

Source: Nuclear Submarine Doubts: US Lawmakers and AUKUS – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Defense

What Price Is ‘Defense?’: America’s Costly, Dysfunctional Approach to Security Is Making Us Ever Less Safe – scheerpost.com

The assumption is that when it comes to spending on the military and related activities, more is always better.

Source: What Price Is ‘Defense?’: America’s Costly, Dysfunctional Approach to Security Is Making Us Ever Less Safe – scheerpost.com

Russia

How Russia Destroys its Male Population – CounterPunch.org

People attend women's protest in front of the Russian embassy in Vilnius

 

The question today is how the Russian government will react to the protests. Russian wives and mothers have played a destabilizing role in other wars and they are now working to destabilize the current war against Ukraine. While many supported Putin’s initial moves, today they realize they are losing their sons and brothers for no reason other than to fulfill Putin’s maniacal desire to conquer Ukraine. Putin and his henchmen will attempt to assuage the women – while working to silence them as soon as possible. Putin needs their men to fight his ego war – even if it means he must destroy Russia’s entire male population once and for all.

Source: How Russia Destroys its Male Population – CounterPunch.org

Israel

Is Israel’s Netanyahu even worse than Trump?

Bibi has abandoned decades US treaty agreements including Camp David and Oslo, UN Resolutions and thoughtful Israeli policies. Though peace talks have been frozen for years, the new government’s proposed steps would be the death knell for Israeli democracy and Palestinian human rights. Considering the flagrant manner in which Bibi has broken many sacrosanct U.S.-Israeli treaties and agreements, you wish the Biden Administration would get serious about formally sanctioning Israel for these violations by withholding aid, and calling them out at the U.N. Yeah, that’ll be the day.

Source: Is Israel’s Netanyahu even worse than Trump?

Trump

Trump: There Were No Classified Docs. I Kept ‘Empty Folders’ As A ‘Keepsake’ | Crooks and Liars

Trump: There Were No Classified Docs. I Kept 'Empty Folders' As A 'Keepsake'

 

Former President Donald Trump is once again lashing out over special counsel Jack Smith’s investigation into his handling of classified documents. This time, though, he didn’t call out Smith by name. Trump is dubiously claiming that he possessed empty folders that he considered a “cool keepsake.”

Source: Trump: There Were No Classified Docs. I Kept ‘Empty Folders’ As A ‘Keepsake’ | Crooks and Liars

Fight against Fake News, Fighting Fake News

Old Dog Thought- Once ocean Junk was Chinese it isn’t any longer

Fighting Fake News with REAL 19/1/23, The Shovel, AUKUS, Jim Molan, The Butcher,

ALP Government,

The Secret Diary of a Prime Minister – Michael West

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, diary, FOI, Rex Patrick

Has MWM and Rex Patrick little or nothing to write about blaming the ALP and the recently elected PM Albanese’s government for not having his finger equally attending to every change on their list of promises? Is Albo the head of this government expected to be the stamp licker, bookkeeper and office janitor as well as the Party and Country’s leader? He’s already changed the direction of the country in the eyes of the world and is turning the ship. He may not be Gough but then MWM and Patrick seem to have taken on the cloak of nitpickers for nitpicking sake alone to keep up their image of “we’ll keep the bastards honest”. Whinging isn’t a substitute for criticism just a haggle over the list of minutia priorities.

In my case they’ve told me my request will cost an outrageous $1,344 to process 179 days displayed in weekly view – that is to process 29 pages of diary. I say that’s ‘outrageous’ having personally made more than 300 FOIs request over the past 5 years and never been charged that sort of money, even for far more voluminous requests.

Transparency builds confidence in our political leaders. Attempting to bury or stall an FOI diary request just does the opposite. It promotes the idea that the Prime Minster is disingenuous in his claims that his Government is transparent, and it erodes people trust in him”.

And when the mud starts flying about, some of it inevitably sticks.

Source: The Secret Diary of a Prime Minister – Michael West

Power

Power corrupts … – » The Australian Independent Media Network

 

Unfortunately there are millions of people around the world that are doing good works in the name of the Catholic Church, whether it be assisting people to find food, clothing and shelter, providing health care and emotional support to individuals or communities that are in distress. There are hundreds of practical and genuinely helpful programs across countless communities around the world routinely organised in the name of the Catholic Church. Yet it seems that some of the male hierarchy of the Catholic Church are more interested in retaining the status quo and their power than adapting their organisation to be relevant to the commonly accepted standards of the communities the organisation is active in. The decreasing number of those that are actually doing the good in the name of the Catholic Church have been dudded yet again.

 Dudding those at the bottom of the power pyramid seems to be a common trait of those in power. Maybe it’s true – power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

Source: Power corrupts … – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Israel

US Dept of Education rebuffs Israel lobby demands | The Electronic Intifada

A group of protesters hold signs and Palestine flags. One banner reads We Will Not Be Silent in English and Arabic.

Israel Lobby demands any criticism be shut down in the US.  How is it that we don’t hear of the lobby’s activity here in Australia? Other than Andrew Bolt monotonously saying “I’m a friend of the Jews”when his family origins are Alsmeer the Dutch most notorious hotbed of Nazi support in WW2. On that topic Bolt is his own lobbyist and never mentions it other than it’s a place he made a pilgrimage to annually before Covid.

Civil rights experts and Palestine solidarity activists are commending the US Department of Education for not caving into demands by Israel lobby groups and lawmakers to redefine anti-Jewish bigotry to include criticism of Israel.

Source: US Dept of Education rebuffs Israel lobby demands | The Electronic Intifada

Israel

|Inventing the new antisemitism +972 Magazine

Pro-Israel and pro-Palestine protesters face off as thousands march in the streets of London against the celebration of the 100th anniversary for the Balfour Declaration, with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu joining the event, November 4, 2017. (Ahmad Al-Bazz/Activestills)

In the local and international media alike, these reforms are largely being portrayed as an “attack on Israeli democracy” — as if there exists an Israel that is separate from its military rule over and denial of basic rights to a civilian population for over half a century. But as the campaign to ban criticism of the occupation teaches, the true goal of the extreme right runs deeper: not only to cement its control in the political system and in all branches of government, but to establish a new political order; to take control of more land (by legalizing outposts and settlements, and displacing Palestinian communities), to deprive Palestinians of agency, outlaw their narrative and prosecute their political representation; to isolate and shame their Jewish supporters; and ultimately to criminalize any opposition to a political order of Jewish supremacy. These risks should concern liberal Jews and Palestinians alike, not in a distant future, but right now.

Source: Can Israeli documentary film survive as a haven for criticism of the occupation? | +972 Magazine

Capitalism

Turning Influence Into Money in the EU Parliament – CounterPunch.org

It’s petty cash compared with what media influencers like Murdoch’s News Corp and Sky News can achieve. “News” is an illusion that runs second to their primary product of the business of influence and persuasion and worse confusion. The magic it always continues despite regular failures as recently seen in Australia, US and the UK. Money flows from the top down from the capital accumulation of the ever-expanding wealthiest interests and from not the bottom up. Money from the bottom up tends to be a competition among grifters like Trump, QAnon, Alex Jones et al the bottom feeders trying to impress individuals and ambitious smaller fry extreme associations. The camp followers of Capitalism.

It is not as though MEPs are poorly remunerated to begin with, each of them earning about €9,400 a month as well as €4,800 general expenses for which they need not produce receipts. In addition, they are allowed to hold as many other jobs as they want with the nature of their activities often declared in the most general and untransparent way.

Source: Turning Influence Into Money in the EU Parliament – CounterPunch.org

Australia's Shame

The rest of the world is in disbelief at what the gambling industry has pulled off in Australia. We need real reform | Tim Costello | The Guardian

A person gambles on a poker machine at a pub in Sydney, Australia, September 19, 2022.

 

For decades it seems Australian politics, especially in NSW, has been dominated by three major entities – the two major political parties and the gambling industry.

The state has half of the nation’s pokies and, incredibly, 35% of the world’s pokies in its clubs and pubs. With such ubiquitous accessibility it is no wonder Australia has the greatest gambling losses in the world – 40% greater than the nation that comes second.

Gambling does the most harm to the people and communities of NSW that Labor is supposed to represent

Source: The rest of the world is in disbelief at what the gambling industry has pulled off in Australia. We need real reform | Tim Costello | The Guardian

Informed Comment

Billionaires Gobbled up 2/3s of New Wealth at $2.7 bn/ day, as 800 million go to bed Hungry: Oxfam

The East India Corporation did it to India, China and the West Indies it was termed PLUNDER the unregulated process of “free marketing” whitewashed and legitimised by the British government. It has never stopped since its systemised corporate application came into being only allowed to accelerate and be refined with the politics and media that promote it rewarded in return. Piracy has never really stopped merely redefined.

Oxfam , the British charity, has released a new report finding that the global problem of wealth inequality is growing ever more threatening. Of all the new wealth the entire human race has produced in the past two years, the richest 1% gobbled up 66% of it. The less-rich 99% of us only got a third of it.

Source: Billionaires Gobbled up 2/3s of New Wealth at $2.7 bn/ day, as 800 million go to bed Hungry: Oxfam

Trump

Court proceedings reveal MBS paid Trump “millions in the past two years”: Human rights group | Salon.com

Donald Trump, President of the United States of America (USA), and Mohammed bin Salman bin Abdelasis al-Saud, Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, stand side by side in the group picture at the start of the G20 summit, June 2019. (Bernd von Jutrczenka/picture alliance via Getty Images)

The business of being President the laundry business according to Trump. Anything and everything is washable.

DAWN calls for DOJ probe after revelation that MBS owns nearly all of Trump-partnered LIV Golf.

Source: Court proceedings reveal MBS paid Trump “millions in the past two years”: Human rights group | Salon.com

Trump

Trump Bashes ‘Disloyal’ Evangelical Leaders | Crooks and Liars

Trump Bashes 'Disloyal' Evangelical Leaders

This won’t play well for the MAGA cult if Trump keeps bashing his base. But Trump always needs a scapegoat when he loses or feels threatened.

Source: Trump Bashes ‘Disloyal’ Evangelical Leaders | Crooks and Liars

Fight against Fake News, Fighting Fake News

Old Dog Thought- Gambling the great Australian cost swept under the carpet

Fighting Fake News with REAL 18/1/23, FOI, Tim Costello reveals,

Informed Comment

The Liberal Party seems to be a bit racist

The Liberal Party needs to be held accountable for its racist attitudes and scandals that largely get brushed aside, writes Dr Victoria Fielding.

Source: The Liberal Party seems to be a bit racist

Asylum Seekers

Are allegations of bogus asylum claims valid? – Pearls and Irritations

Australian Flag as Background and Silhouettes of People

Hannah Dickinson, an asylum lawyer from the Asylum Seeker Rights Centre, is reported in The Canberra Times to “have rubbished suggestions people are seizing on huge backlogs of asylum applications to lodge bogus claims for protection”.

Source: Are allegations of bogus asylum claims valid? – Pearls and Irritations

George Pell

George Pell ‘Devil Incarnate’ is dead – » The Australian Independent Media Network

The Last Judgement

Content warning: this article discusses rape, sexual abuse and violence. * Support phone numbers at end of this article. Reach out, please.

Source: George Pell ‘Devil Incarnate’ is dead – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Fight against Fake News, Fighting Fake News, Uncategorized

The war powers inquiry

Debt

How Private Equity Amplifies the Abuse of Predatory Lending – CounterPunch.org

Predatory lending is an easily overlooked business that has damaged communities of color and poorer people for decades. It traps borrowers in never-ending cycles of debt with high-interest loans on coercive terms. But when Wall Street private equity gets in on the predatory lending industry, it amplifies the magnitude of financial exploitation.

Source: How Private Equity Amplifies the Abuse of Predatory Lending – CounterPunch.org

Informed Comment

ExxonMobil predicted climate change but kept the world burning

Decades ago, research conducted by ExxonMobil predicted the global effects of climate change, which was then denied in the name of profit, writes Dr Binoy Kampmark.

Source: ExxonMobil predicted climate change but kept the world burning

Climate Change denial

The Media’s Remarkable Silence on the Cause of California’s Tragic Storms | The Smirking Chimp

Each climate calamity we endure is another learning opportunity for the nation to understand the existential threat of climate change and why we must take the lead in reversing it. For the media to avoid talking about it is a loss for democracy.

Source: The Media’s Remarkable Silence on the Cause of California’s Tragic Storms | The Smirking Chimp

Politics

White House Calls GOP Frenzy Over Biden Classified Docs ‘Shamelessly Hypocritical’ | HuffPost Latest News

The GOP-led House Oversight Committee is investigating the president over the documents, but has no plans to probe Donald Trump’s cache of government files.

Source: White House Calls GOP Frenzy Over Biden Classified Docs ‘Shamelessly Hypocritical’ | HuffPost Latest News

FBI

J. Edgar Hoover was the QAnon of his Era, and Martin Luther King Jr. was the Victim of his Dirty Tricks

The unchecked system versus a man

In all the years the FBI monitored King under the COINTELPRO domestic surveillance program, no evidence ever surfaced that he was a Communist or anything like a Communist. Instead of calling off his dogs, however, Hoover doubled down and used the monitoring of King’s personal life to gather evidence of his extramarital affairs. Hoover then tried to use those tapes to convince King that his reputation would be ruined and that he should commit suicide.

Source: J. Edgar Hoover was the QAnon of his Era, and Martin Luther King Jr. was the Victim of his Dirty Tricks

Fight against Fake News, Fighting Fake News

Old Dog Thought- 2 Men of God George Pell and Martin Luther King note the difference

Fighting Fake News with REAL, 17/1/23, Every Picture tells a story,

Liberal Party

The Liberal Party is dead: can it be revived? – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Peter Dutton looks at Scott Morrison

A cry from the Liberal Party wilderness

The capitalists reveal repeatedly that without regulation too many of them will act without scruple. The fact that human civilisation is plunging towards existential crisis without concerted action to cushion the collapse is only the most dramatic example. We have had decades since Maggie Thatcher and George HW Bush discussed global warming as uncontroversial to steer away from carbon-based energy production. Instead we only mired ourselves in the tribal divisions that the lobbyists created, despite the fact that deaths and displacement have begun.

The Liberal party has, like the Republicans and Tories, invested itself in being the party of culture war division rather than a force for government. If one does not believe that government can solve problems but is rather purely a drag on the capitalist, destruction can be embraced. There is profit in chaos and dysfunction: disaster capitalism is even more lucrative than the peacetime version.

If a party has no real platform other than obliging the donors and keeping the opposition out of power, there is no campaign possible aside from disinformation and distraction.

 

Source: The Liberal Party is dead: can it be revived? – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Information

How to become a commercial drone pilot – Michael West

Looking for a side hustle or a fresh career? Then flying drones may be for you, and getting a licence can be easier and quicker than learning to drive.

Source: How to become a commercial drone pilot – Michael West

Media

Up For Auction: The Contents of an Inconsequential Mind – » The Australian Independent Media Network

If taste may be characterised as a capacity for self-restraint, this is a virtue neither visible here nor generally associated with AJOA who, among other singular achievements was in 2007 deemed to have encouraged the Cronulla riots and engaged in the vilification of Lebanese people. Like a boxed set, AJOA’s racism has been consistently accompanied by a relentless misogyny (some memorable instances being that in his opinion women leaders were “destroying the joint”, recommending Julia Gillard be taken out to sea in a chaff bag, and that New Zealand prime minister Jacinda Ardern have a sock shoved down her throat for her public views on climate), a characterological explanation for which remains elusive despite the grovelling walk-backs and apologies.

Source: Up For Auction: The Contents of an Inconsequential Mind – » The Australian Independent Media Network

America

Will Birtherism come back to bite Republicans in the Behind? On top of all his other Lies, is George Santos even a US Citizen?

Nashville (Special to Informed Comment) – Suspicions grow that not only did new Congressman George Santos (R-NY) fabricate his educational and employment record but that he fabricated a marriage in order to get a permanent residency permit (‘green card’).

Let us, as the intel people say, ‘walk the cat backwards’ — ask a series of questions, each reaching further back in time and leading to some logical conclusions.

Santos is openly gay. He says he has a husband and wears a wedding band. Fine. But why then did he marry an American women in 2012 and stay married to her

Source: Will Birtherism come back to bite Republicans in the Behind? On top of all his other Lies, is George Santos even a US Citizen?

CIA

CIA Pushes for Dismissal of Lawsuit Against Alleged Spying on Assange Visitors – scheerpost.com

America the Land exemplifying Freedom has the most incarcerated citizens on the planet. A business you can invest in on the stock exchange

By Kevin Gosztola / The Dissenter The Central Intelligence Agency and former CIA director Mike Pompeo notified a federal court in New York that they intend to push for the dismissal of a lawsuit that alleges that they were involved in spying against attorneys and journalists who visited WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in Ecuador’s London […]

The filed complaint alleged that as visitors Glass, Goetz, Hrbek, and Kunstler were required to “surrender” their electronic devices to employees of a private company called UC Global that was contracted to provide security for the embassy. What they did not know was that UC Global “copied the information stored on the devices” and allegedly shared the information with the CIA, and Pompeo allegedly authorized and approved the action.

Security contractors required the attorneys and journalists to leave their devices with them, which contained “confidential and privileged information about their sources or clients.”

 

Source: CIA Pushes for Dismissal of Lawsuit Against Alleged Spying on Assange Visitors – scheerpost.com

Israel

Israeli Opposition Warns of “Civil War,” “End of Democracy” as 80,000 Rally against Netanyahu

The Palestinian newspaper Amad reports that tens of thousands of Israelis took part on Saturday evening in demonstrations in Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and Haifa protesting the new Israeli government, headed by Binyamin Netanyahu. The Hebrew press reported a massive police presence at these sites.

Source: Israeli Opposition Warns of “Civil War,” “End of Democracy” as 80,000 Rally against Netanyahu

Israel

Israel helps Ukraine whitewash its Nazis – Pearls and Irritations

Azov people with nazi flag.

Representatives of Ukraine’s neo-Nazi Azov Battalion have been touring Israel to drum up support for the unit’s imprisoned fighters.

In 2018, Israeli human rights lawyer Eitay Mack wrote to the Israeli government to object that the country’s aid to Ukraine was being used by neo-Nazis.

In response, the government confirmed that its arms licenses to Ukraine were granted “in full coordination with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and other government entities” but did not deny arming Ukrainian Nazis.

The Electronic Intifada’s 2018 exposé of Israel’s arming of Ukrainian Nazis caused a minor diplomatic incident, when Ukraine’s ambassador to Israel wrote a formal complaint to Haaretz after the newspaper echoed our reporting.

Mack petitioned Israel’s highest court to stop the state arming Ukrainian Nazis. The government responded by requesting hearings be held behind closed doors and imposing a gag order on the press.

 

Source: Israel helps Ukraine whitewash its Nazis – Pearls and Irritations

Informed Comment

Gaoling a president is a helluva challenge, but sometimes it has to be done

Safeguarding democracy worldwide looms as a major task for 2023, requiring global collaboration to succeed, as Alan Austin reports.

Source: Gaoling a president is a helluva challenge, but sometimes it has to be done

Fight against Fake News, Fighting Fake News

Old Dog Thought- Murdoch fled the UK to the US where spying is a Free and protected activity

Fighting Fake News with REAL, 16/1/23, Covid is back, The Global Polycrisis,Become a drone pilot, CIA spies on Julian Assange’s visitor’s

Mental Health, Mental Illness

Study Moves Therapeutic Use of MDMA Toward FDA Approval

MOUNT PLEASANT, SC, USA - AUGUST 24: A dose of MDMA in the office of Dr. Michael Mithoefer, a psychiatrist, who has studied the use of MDMA as a treatment for PTSD in Mount Pleasant, SC, USA on August 24, 2017. (Photo by Travis Dove for The Washington Post via Getty Images)

The drug scored positive results in a clinical trial designed to meet FDA standards.

Source: Study Moves Therapeutic Use of MDMA Toward FDA Approval

Australia's Shame

Peter Dutton’s approach to referendum on Indigenous voice straight from John Howard’s playbook | Paul Karp | The Guardian

Opposition leader, Peter Dutton (right), with former prime minister John Howard.

When Politics gets in the way of what’s right for the sake of maintaining what’s always been wrong since Invasion Day

Conservatives say the Indigenous voice to parliament could divide Australians – but they’ve found some clever ways of doing that themselves

Source: Peter Dutton’s approach to referendum on Indigenous voice straight from John Howard’s playbook | Paul Karp | The Guardian

George Pell

God says Cardinal George Pell will go to hell. Unless of course, God’s teachings in the Bible are a lie.Kangaroo Court of Australia

Above is only a small part of the evidence against George Pell and any true believer in God and his teachings should acknowledge that Pell has gone to Hell. That raises the question of why do people including Pope Francis continue to support Pell.

Source: God says Cardinal George Pell will go to hell. Unless of course, God’s teachings in the Bible are a lie.Kangaroo Court of Australia

Informed Comment

Informed Comment- Robert Reich, Government Subsidies, Corporate Welfare
ALP Government,

Albo is in denial. He seeks protection and reassurance – Pearls and Irritations

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese

Instead of thinking through and independently acting in Australia’s best interests, Prime Minister Albanese has followed in the footsteps of his discredited predecessors and outsourced defence and foreign policy to the US.

Source: Albo is in denial. He seeks protection and reassurance – Pearls and Irritations

Informed Comment

Australia’s industrial makeover ramps up – Michael West

Worry is always the decision-makers’ burden when moving forward and doing things “right”. Unintended mistakes tend to occur but are often politicized by the opposition, and oh boy, did we see that with the”Pink Bats” scandal. But here is the difference the difference ” Robodebt” The NBN and Asylum seeker deaths were wrong, Yes. one was right the other totally wrong on human and AI grounds and none were accomplished overnight. Pink Bats couldn’t be predicted to have 5 deaths the other three could be guaranteed to be system failures on a grand scale. .

The Chubb review shows there’s integrity in the carbon credit system designed to support decarbonisation, but Ms Constable is concerned about the proposed rapid changes for the regulator. “It takes time to build expertise and get things running smoothly, so we’ll be watching to make sure implementation matches the ambition.”

Source: Australia’s industrial makeover ramps up – Michael West

COVID-19

Michael West Media -Long long covid: Australia’s pandemic performance needs a booster, say experts, as deaths rise

Long long covid: Australia’s pandemic performance needs a booster, say experts, as deaths rise

Australia’s performance in fighting Covid has declined as scientists say researchers are set back by inadequate data systems. Deaths are rising more than predicted, strain on hospitals too. Michael Sainsbury reports the latest on a pandemic which just won’t go away, amid heightened concerns over Long Covid, vaccine impact and the threat of new strains.

Source: Michael West Media – investigative journalists – always independent

The World

Mad World: Global Flashpoints to watch in 2023 in the Era of ‘Polycrisis’

World leaders are dealing with a host of pressing issues:

the climate emergency

the socio-economic repercussions of the COVID pandemic, by no means over

100 million displaced people

the increasing global population, now over eight billion

the rising cost of living.

All this means 2023 is likely to be another turbulent year.The Conversation

Source: Mad World: Global Flashpoints to watch in 2023 in the Era of ‘Polycrisis’

Israel

Over a Hundred Thousand Israelis Protest Netanyahu Government

Tel Aviv Protest Against Benjamin Netanyahu

If they’d been Palestinian children waving their flag they’d have been shot.

“Elections do not give anyone the power to destroy democracy itself,” said former Justice Minister Tzipi Livni as she addressed the protest in Tel Aviv, adding that Israel’s far-right government is “carrying out a political takeover of the country and waging a war against its democratic institutions.”

Source: Over a Hundred Thousand Israelis Protest Netanyahu Government

Industrial Military complex

Weapons Contractors Destroy Lives While Reading Fairy Tales To Children – scheerpost.com

You probably already know that, as reported by Alex Kane for In These Times in 2019, “Saudi Arabia, one of the world’s richest countries, has been bombing Yemen, the fifth-poorest nation in the world, since 2015—with support from the United States.”

Dan Sabbagh of The Guardian reported in 2020 that “BAE Systems sold £15bn worth of arms to Saudis during Yemen assault.” That number is two years old. It’s many billions higher now.

BAE Systems doesn’t want us to only think of them as serial murderers. According to their Public Relations Department, they are also interested in reading fairy tales to children.

Source: Weapons Contractors Destroy Lives While Reading Fairy Tales To Children – scheerpost.com

Fight against Fake News, Fighting Fake News

Old Dog Thought- Why is education not a basic right as opposed to being sold as a debt-generating product wrapped in 5-star packaging.

Fighting Fake News with REAL, 15/1/23 France’s Legislated Food Welfare, The Murdoch difference, Pell is another example, Cost of Education, Coastal Complaint,

Informed Comment

Ideas for a better democracy – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Australians are sticklers for tradition when it comes to our Constitution. Despite 44 proposed changes, only eight have ever been successful.

Source: Ideas for a better democracy – » The Australian Independent Media Network

Education

Swiss Scandal: A Canton Tries to Raise University Fees – CounterPunch.org

Council for American Private Education

4.5 mill Americans are privately educated. The Swiss are complaining about their fees rising to $750 per semester. Australian private schooling is $45,000 pa. Plus “living costs”

Some recent U.S. figures to consider in relation to Swiss costs although not always in the same category: The cost of private nursery school in New York City has been reported to be at around $40,000. Private schools, non-boarding, are in the $50,000 range, and private universities at $75,000. To calculate: A child starting nursery school at age two would cost 3x$40,000=$120,00; 13x$50,000=$650,000; 4x$75,000=$300,000; a total over one million dollars including a bachelor’s degree for a child’s education

Source: Swiss Scandal: A Canton Tries to Raise University Fees – CounterPunch.org