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Tue, 2017-08-01 00:21

The following was posted to the discussion in response to Heroes of Our Time: Defenders of Deir ez-Zor (31/7/17) Russian Insider

Dorothy wrote:

"Regime-controlled territory" ( see map key )

"Government-controlled territory" is the correct term.

Thanks for picking up on this, Dorothy. The BIG LIE that the Syrian government is a brutal regime seems to have been accepted even by a number of those opposed to the war against Syria.

To the contrary, few other governments across the globe can claim to have as much legitimacy as that of President Bashar al-Assad. Not even the parties governing the formal Western democracies, which have shamefully colluded with Israel, the dictatorships of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE and the 'elected' Turkish government against Syria for nearly nearly six and a half years, can claim to have anywhere near the popular support that Bashar al-Assad gained in the Presidential election of June 2014.

As cited in the article above, according to a report Syrian election sends powerful signal of Assad’s control (3/6/14) from the Israeli publication Haaretz which can hardly be accused of bias towards the Syrian government, 88.7% of the 73.42% of eligible Syrian voters who voted, voted for President Bashar al-Assad. So, of 15,845,575 Syrians eligible to vote, eligible voters 10,319,723 or 65.13% voted for Bashar al-Assad.

That the elections were run properly was attested to at a press conference of five international observers at the United Nations on 20 June 2014. (See the article above (including the embedded 52 minute video) and the original article at Global Research. Not one of the 'reporters' who had been feeding their readers the narrative of the supposedly hated "Assad regime", and continue to do so, attempted to challenge those observers on that day.

Flora Fauna (not verified)

Fri, 2017-07-21 22:30

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quark

Thu, 2017-07-20 08:02

There is no doubt that ingredients are a pretty important part of a meal and i think good fresh ingredients were very available in the period so despised by writers like Jessica Irvine. Cuisine is a trivial point to raise in favour of mass immigration, especially when this art form is inaccurately reported. if it is going to be used to make irrevocable massive changes to Australia's population then let's get our facts right! PHD, anyone?

Sheila Newman

Tue, 2017-07-18 11:53

[Responding to Quark's comment of "Propaganda boredom" about Jessica Irvine's article at https://www.theage.com.au/business/the-economy/why-i-love-a-big-australi... ] Jessica carries on about how Australians all ate really boring meals before mass immigration. It's the elevation of gastroporn (glossy overeating programs) to a prescribed religion. Robert Doyle, in a Planning Backlash population debate (October 2014) where he was soundly beaten by Kelvin Thomson had, as virtually his only debating 'point' the idea that mass immigration brought the cappuccino to Australia. Cappuccino is just espresso coffee with milk. I looked this up and found that two Australians who went to London and brought back a espresso machine to Melbourne and started this trend in 1953. Not Italians or recent immigrants, and they didn't go to Italy to get it. In fact, Australia had a coffee culture going back to the 1850s. See http://www.emelbourne.net.au/biogs/EM00370b.htm "In 1953 Henry Cyril Bancroft and his son Peter, having visited London's first espresso bar, secured the agency and manufacturing rights to Gaggia machines, opening Il Capuccino (sic) in St Kilda the following year. They successfully set the demand for machines, which were soon purchased by the University Café in Lygon Street and Pellegrini's in Bourke Street." With regard to the simple (or dull) food of yore: This is a class snobbery thing. Further more, the idea that Australians never ate classy food until the 1960s or so is an introduced false belief. Poor people with little education cooked simple meals, but the middle and upper classes, who could read, used, at the very least, Mrs Beaton - an English cooking seer and author of many books on haute and middle cuisine as well as how to run a houseful of servants. Mrs Beaten's book contained recipes from all over the world and reflected material from British colonies. You can find clam chowder and curries, French sauces and Italian and South American dishes. Plus what wine to drink with everything. When I was growing up in the 1970s, I used frequently to dine on lobster, scallops, prawns and Morton Bay bugs. And my father speared fish in our back yard in Sydney harbour (where I could not afford to live today). What poor person can afford good seafood today? Lobster, scallops and prawns are now all exported, and lobster is so small that I cannot bring myself to eat it, since these almost immortal creatures that migrate across the oceans have been reduced to scarcity. The last decent sized lobster I saw was deep in a hole in a rocky island on the Mornington Peninsula, and I will never reveal its home. It is true that I learned to eat snails and frogs' legs from the French diaspora post 1968 riots, which created many affordable French restaurants, but I can no longer afford to eat in French restaurants and the cost of snails is prohibitive. Tins of boiled oysters for oyster chowder are also almost impossible to get, by the way. What do people in Australia eat today? Many eat huge quantities of cheap simple carbohydrates mixed with fat: rice, potatoes, pasta, breakfast cereals and bread to which is added lashings of corn-syrup (fructose) by many different names. The country that produced tall lean athletes raised on meat and eggs now produces obese and sickly B12 deficient, diabetes II types and we have a climbing rate of myopia, due to the restriction of young peoples' outdoor range and activity. What has this got to do with multiculturalism? Nothing much, except its false association with a big population. The big population has put pressure on resources, so we pay more for food and water and power and land for housing. And cereals have been marketed as a substitute for protein by governments and big business, possibly sometimes abusing the concept of 'multiculturalism' to popularise unhealthy amounts of pasta and bread. Australian aborigines had highly varied and healthy diets and were lean and fit. Until they were introduced to industrial quantities of flour and alcohol and went the way of other simple carb-naive peoples, including the Irish and the Scotch.

John Bentley (not verified)

Tue, 2017-07-18 11:13

To say that Australia has no culture is paradoxical in the fact that it obviously doesn't include the first Australians. Indigenous Australians have the most wonderful and uplifting culture that is only matched by other indigenous cultures. Their connection to the land makes their culture unique as all actions by humanity affect the land. As an Australian of white Anglo-Saxon descent I have very little connection with my forbears' culture. I am endeavouring to learn more about the culture of the First nations of Australia and I encourage all Australians to do the same. When I pass there will be no service, there will be song and dance and the opportunity for all and sundry to speak their mind. Maybe the Christian diaspora you believe in is overstated!

quark

Tue, 2017-07-18 08:13

Jessica must be getting bored with her own arguments. She even used the culinary argument in her latest: that Australians only knew how to cook apricot chicken and a couple of other dishes a few decades ago-probably around the time she was born and on a diet of milk only. I guess jobs are hard to get so she is stuck in this one.

Simone (not verified)

Wed, 2017-07-12 11:09

Comment originally headed, "Chin people want to be visible in Australia." Title changed by candobetter.net editor to emphasise the point made in the comment. Mind you, it might seem equally mysterious to the casual web-surfer. And, is the census trying to find our what religion we all are or is it using religion as an indicator of ethnic identification? Chin people want to be visible in Australia. In the news yesterday was an item about the fastest growing ethnic group in Australia, the Chin people of western Myanmar who distinguish themselves by culture and religion from the Burmese in general. They wanted to show up in the census, lobbied for it in some way and succeeded. People in Australia who have a Christian background but for whom church is not part of their lives or they do not follow Christianity literally, it would seem have done the opposite to the Chin people and in a way have made themselves invisible by saying they have no religion. This, to me adds fuel to the myth that "Australia has no culture." Maybe the question itself in the census should be re- worked, so that those emanating from a Christian tradition (and whose funeral services will in all likelihood call on some the traditional Christian favourites like the 23rd Psalm or the Lord's prayer )can be counted as belonging to this tradition even though their beliefs,interpretations and daily priorities are some distance from this. The question of religion as reflecting private beliefs on the day on the day of the census has the potential to reflect a sort of neutrality or blankness in Australia which is misleading.Shouldn't those with a Christian background however reticent they are to lay claim to it in everyday life also be visible?.

Mat Mitchell (not verified)

Tue, 2017-07-11 13:41

Sheila, "Christians placed their god outside the universe and thereby distanced themselves from the earth." - perhaps some people think that, I am not sure Christians do. Christians placed God in the heart of man (i.e each individual) as a spirit to be experienced very personally as love, and in the voice of conscience, rather than in material things - those are just to be seen as His works. To visualise God, a Christian would bring to mind the person of Christ - as someone like themselves - humble, meek, suffering, rather than some super human deity like Thor. Chesterton describes Christianity as follows: "Christianity is the only religion on earth that has felt that omnipotence made God incomplete." "Alone of all creeds, Christianity has added courage to the virtues of the Creator. For the only courage worth calling courage must necessarily mean that the soul passes a breaking point -- and does not break." " [...] the cry from the cross: the cry which confessed that God was forsaken of God. And now let the revolutionists choose a creed from all the creeds and a god from all the gods of the world, carefully weighing all the gods of inevitable recurrence and of unalterable power. They will not find another god who has himself been in revolt. Nay (the matter grows too difficult for human speech), but let the atheists themselves choose a god. They will find only one divinity who ever uttered their isolation; only one religion in which God seemed for an instant to be an atheist.” And Chesterton compares the Panthiest view with the Christian view in this way: "The main point of Christianity was this: that Nature is not our mother: Nature is our sister. We can be proud of her beauty, since we have the same father; but she has no authority over us; we have to admire, but not to imitate. " "Nature was a solemn mother to the worshipers of Isis and Cybele. Nature was a solemn mother to Wordsworth or to Emerson. But Nature is not solemn to Francis of Assisi or to George Herbert. To St. Francis, Nature is a sister, and even a younger sister: a little, dancing sister, to be laughed at as well as loved.”

Sheila Newman

Mon, 2017-07-10 20:21

Okay, Matthew, I looked at it. Very clear vid. Thanks. I don't get, however, CS Lewis's argument that he (a) was pantheist but worried that the world was cruel and injust and the universe therefore senseless (b) therefore became a Christian. Because if he was a pantheist, he would not feel that the world was cruel and injust; he would feel perhaps that there was cruelty and injustice from certain perspectives, without it invalidating the universe, but being a pantheist, he would assume that the god he believed in would not be interested in CS Lewis's perspective alone. Also, pantheists, according to Lewis, believe that God is in everything, whereas Christians, according to Lewis, think that God is only in the bits their religion deems 'good'. This reminds me of something that Durkheim wrote, that non-heirarchical peoples had local gods that were a reflection of their tribe and its environment and not separate, and Ancient Greeks, more hierarchical, removed their gods to a mountain nearby, but Christians placed their god outside the universe and thereby distanced themselves from the earth. I think that the belief in a God the father that is a moral force derives from a human family view of the universe, with the earthly children seeking approval and reassurance from that father. But others - the pantheistic and the atheists and non-theists presumably can see that there is order there and thermodynamic etc rules, and animal including human rules, which include justice.

Sheila Newman

Sun, 2017-07-09 22:19

It seems to me that there is a difference between an individual belief in a god or gods (belief) and a group believing that these gods hand down a particular moral code (religion). Religious beliefs can be used to manipulate people by those who claim to have special information from gods. Religions are kind of like governments. Progress is a religion. Does no-one else conceive of the idea of a universal force that has no interest in how we behave? Or Mother Nature who rules through the laws of thermodynamics, strictly impersonally? (And 'smart cities' engineers who tell us they can control nature.) (It is late, I may be raving.)

Matt (not verified)

Sat, 2017-07-08 13:51

John, you say "you don't need to be religious to be able to love and respect others, you don't need to be religious to be an honest and decent person and you don't need to be religious to do unto others as you would have them do unto you." Quite right. But being religious does not prevent you being these things either. One underlying principle of our society is that people can express and defend their ideas and beliefs - without this we can hardly be human. So please do not admonish people for expressing and arguing their beliefs. I am Christian, but I would not say that an athiest, or someone from any other religion should just 'agree to disagree', as in effect that means telling people to shut up. Matt

John Bentley (not verified)

Fri, 2017-07-07 18:43

As a person who is irreligious and who finds those who are religious (atheists included) confused, garrulous and way over the top, it's time to start loving their fellow man. This diatribe that my religion is better than yours is discriminatory in every aspect. Your religion or the lack of it is entirely a personal thing whatever it may be. You don't need to be religious to be able to love and respect others, you don't need to be religious to be an honest and decent person and you don't need to be religious to do unto others as you would have them do unto you. Why do we have to categorise people? Putting them into little boxes - "this goes with this and this goes with that......" I prefer to take people on face value, if I don't agree with something that they say, do or believe and if it is not against the law of the land then so be it. Agree to disagree and get on with your life and let them get on with theirs. Forgive and forget!

Matt (not verified)

Fri, 2017-07-07 15:22

I been watching a series covering the period of Alfred the Great. His was the last little Kingdom (Wessex) still standing as the Pagan Vikings gradually subdued England. By some miracle, Alfred managed not only to resist the vikings, but subdue them, and in doing so united England under one King. It is an amazing story, he was very pious and he converted the Pagan king whom he defeated into Christianity, thus moving England from Paganism to Christianity. And doing so getting rid of a lot of savagery and superstition. The series is called "The Last Kingdom" if anyone is interested, it is a bit Hollywoodised (actually a British production I think), but follows the basic historical story fairly well as we know it today. And yes, it shared culture that binds people. Who would fight for globalism? or a global state?

VivKay (not verified)

Tue, 2017-07-04 18:05

Some of these atheists are keen to convert people to their non-belief, to "believe" and follow in their vacuum. It's a type of spiritual Terra Nullius, of nobody owning the land, in this case our religious cultural landscape, or heritage. This is about enabling governments to displace our original occupants with and overlay of foreign culture, and endorsing Multiculturalism. If we are a blank canvas, we can be displaced by foreign cultures and religions, and thus support more immigration. More than people losing faith, immigration has diluted our original Christian background. At the corner of Bligh and Hunter Streets on Sunday 3rd February 1788, the first Christian church service was held in the Colony of New South Wales. After Revd Johnson returned to England, the colony of New South Wales was fortunate to receive as a chaplain the Revd Samuel Marsden. Marsden was a man of great faith with a strong desire to serve God. The only other spirituality was that of Indigenous peoples. There's always been a faithful remnant of believers, even though church attendance in some denominations has declined, but churches have transformed remarkably over the years. Many now are non-denomination, without the rituals and traditions of older churches. Seems that the atheists would want to encourage more people to their "church" of no-religion? Some are more evangelical than religious people!

James Sinnamon

Tue, 2017-07-04 13:58

The following comment was posted in response to PUSH THE BUTTON: The Curious Case of Donald Trump’s Expanding Wars (3/7/2017) | 21st Century Wire. The article is highly informative and takes the right side on the most critical geopolitical conflicts of today – Yemen, Somalia, North Korea, Afghanistan and, most of all, Syria. However, it suffers by:

1. Recycling the smear/beat-up used by the mainstream media against Donald Trump during the 2016 Presidential campaign: "Trump seems to exhibit a paraphilia for female blood, a kind of sexual obsession that psychologists call 'Hematolagnia' …"; and, more seriously;

2. Likening the kind, visionary and heroic President John F. Kennedy to his successors including LBJ and Nixon. Amongst JFK's many gifts to humanity, included preventing his Joint Chiefs of Staff from launching thermo-nuclear war on at least two occasions. In contrast, his successors LBJ and Nixon escalated the United States' war against Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia, whilst continuing their interference and support for colonialism elsewhere.

21st Century Wire wrote: "[the anti-war movement] disgracefully refused to confront wars launched by liberal politicians from JFK to Obama."

Is it right to liken John F. Kennedy, murdered by the deep state on 22 November 1963, to the warmongers Johnson, Nixon, etc. (even if only in passing)?

(Spoiler warning: Reading the quote below undermine the dramatic impact of "General Giap Knew" (30/8/2013) by Mani Kang at https://kennedysandking.com/john-f-kennedy-articles/general-giap-knew)

In fact, as attested to in 2011 by Vo Hong Nam, youngest son of Vietnamese General Vo Nguyen Giap (1911-2013), the victor of the 1954 battle of Dien Bien Phu against the French colonialists:

"President Kennedy was withdrawing from Vietnam in late 1963. President Kennedy was finally changing his foreign policy in regards to Vietnam in 1963. ... President Kennedy was withdrawing from Vietnam in late 1963."

The commander in chief of the Vietnamese National Liberation Front (NLF) knew that President John F, Kennedy intended, upon re-election in January 1965, to withdraw all U.S. armed forces from Vietnam. Sadly, JFK's murder on 22 November 1963 prevented that and as a result more than 2 million more Indochinese were to die by 1975.

In the 1950's Senator John F. Kennedy also spoke up against the French Colonial war in Algeria. Senator Kennedy changed the U.S. policy of support for the French colonialists to neutrality. In 1960, as described by Ted Sorrenson in his 1965 biography "Kennedy", Algerian FLN independence fighters told visiting journalists that they were closely watching the U.S. Presidential race in the hope that JFK would win.

In January 1961, after JFK became President, U.S. foreign policy changed to support the Algerian FLN independence fighters.

Were JFK alive today he would undoubtedly oppose the United States' aggression, whether actual or through terrorist proxies, against Syria.

quark

Mon, 2017-07-03 12:09

At the risk of seeming to start an esoteric aesthetic discussion which could bury the important points made in this video, the principle of form follows function can lead to excellent aesthetic results. The problem with the mega buildings which are the targets of this commentator is that the function which they are often trying to fulfil is not justifiable in the first place. How can a good result be obtained when it is seen as necessary to treat people as files and therefore store them in buildings based on filing cabinets? One needs to look at the complexity of what functions a building for people really needs to fulfil. These "storage units" would fail on many counts e.g connection with the outside, connection with neighbours, facilitating autonomy or control over immediate environment. There would be many other requirements for a reasonable quality of life and if these functions were built in the buildings would look very different. The problem is that the number of inhabitants seems often to be the only function that is satisfied and of course you end up with a soul-less monstrosity that is not even safe.

Mat Mitchell (not verified)

Mon, 2017-07-03 10:42

So true - this should have been a huge social issue a long time ago. Architectural schools seem to destroy creativity - why do al modern houses and other buildings look the same? Big ugly boxes. Is there no one who comes out of archicture school who does not adore and worship boxes? What sort of mental lobotomy do they go through in their 5 years of training? And the press presents these things as though people want them - an example from today's paper: "on how our appetite for high-density living is transforming Melbourne and Sydney." http://www.theage.com.au/comment/2016-census-the-high-density-lifestyle-... Being forced into high-density living because that is all that is available or can afforded. Suits investors, and developers who can sell more apartments if they are stacked up high. And why do we have graffiti - what a weird behaviour, I think the video is right - young people look at these impersonal buildings and can think that they deserve nothing better than to be painted in a way that reflects their soullessness. The building builder wanted to make a statement of slef adoration and power, The graffiti tagger uses that as acanvas to make their own narcissistic statement. Matt

Simone (not verified)

Fri, 2017-06-30 10:49

I wonder what the question is trying to know about people in Australia. There would be many who have e.g a Christian background, are familiar with many of the stories in The Bible, New and Old Testament and the gospels but don't think about them from one month to the next. They will have attended many church services but not regularly for many years, be quite familiar with the rituals and conventions and be very attached to the music. They may also pay lip service to traditions such as Easter and Christmas, yet, not have any firm conviction that Heaven or Hell await them depending on behaviour, nor indeed that there is any God in the sense of a focussed deity. There are e.g Jewish people in a similar boat who may, despite being non-believers in God have varying associations with their their traditions. Should they consider themselves atheists or Jews? It's rather line- ball I would have thought and these examples are really 2 distinct groups. The question in isolation has the potential to be rather culture- denying. It would be interesting to know the religious tradition most associated with the ones who identify as atheist. Whether or not you claim to be an atheist depends on your own definition and is really a private matter. I could bet that after i die that I will cease to have any further consciousness for all eternity (and I think that this is most likely) but I am not completely divorced from the religious tradition that is undeniably part of my upbringing. What answer did I give to this question on the census? I honestly can't remember!

Sheila Newman

Tue, 2017-06-27 11:10

The "Age" has an article that attempts to railroad population debate to the decentralisation 'option' that government and opposition currently push as a pretend alternative to urban densification. There are very few comments, but this would be a good forum, since they don't seem to be censoring comments and I was able to get some useful URLs in. You do have to register to comment, but you don't have to pay. http://www.theage.com.au/comment/the-age-editorial/the-population-debate... I sent this. I thought it would not be published, but it has been: "There is a great deal of objection to the issue of the engineering of Australia's population upwards by the state, on sites which include https://candobetter.net and macrobusiness. (Note that despite state pretence that it is the federal government that organises immigration, all states continually advertise for economic immigrants at sites like https://www.liveinvictoria.vic.gov.au/.) When 'population debate' is presented as only about 'decentralisation' as in the above article, well, it pre-empts any serious discussion on a problem that will ultimately threaten survival. It is hardly worth reading the Age on the matter, because the Age functions as a growth-propaganda organ, historically in like with its global property dot com interests as well as its corporate mouthpiece role. Ordinary people are terribly worried about what is being imposed on them undemocratically, at growing financial, environmental and self-determination cost in guise as 'smart cities' or 'decentralisation'. (Whose city is it?) A proactive Bill of Residents' Rights has been devised by members of Planning Backlash and it asks that our population growth be scaled back to the OECD average, which is far less than our current rate, as well as demanding a raft of essential property rights. Wildlife carers are dismayed at the uselessness of Victoria's wildlife protection legislation and the carnage created by expanding road system - yet blamed on the wildlife themselves. Our leaders seem to identify with other 'elites' and against the rest of us. And the ultimate hypocrisy are the obscene wars we pursue in the Middle East then pretend that the flight of refugees and economic migrants from these destroyed economies has nothing to do with US-NATO policy or the history of intervention in this region, in a continuation of brutal trade-wars."

Matthew Mitchell

Fri, 2017-06-23 10:52

Yes, VivKay when I read that proposal for Mega Councils - I thought the same - a further dilution of democracy. And I am not at all convinced that costs would reduce, it would over time just become another impenetrable bureaucracy. Certainly it would be more efficient at developing the few remaining open spaces that we have left. That seemed to be the main intention of the whole proposal. Personally I think there should be a complete ban on the further sale of public lands - nay -that is not enough - we should be seeking to increase open public spaces every year - particularly if they are going to be forcing more people into communities. Anyway, the whole system is completely unsustainable and when the final collapse comes, our urban populations will realise they cannot feed themselves, that their homes are unliveable without air-conditioning and electric heating, and there will be mass migrations away from the cities, no doubt across farmland, damaging food supplies even further. Future generations will avoid the dangerous collapsing structures of our cities which they will not the have the resources to dismantle, and thousands of years from now they will be sad reminders of mankind's worst period of greed, selfishness and folly. Matt

VivKay (not verified)

Wed, 2017-06-21 14:13

Community planning backlash groups who refuse to recognise the pressure of high population growth on what's now called "planning" are being deliberately ignorant, and contradictory. They are nothing more than NIMBYs, who would like to protect their own backyards, heritage and quality of life, and would rather the unwanted "growth" goes elsewhere! They are being rather exclusive and elitist. The Committee of Melbourne is now in their own backlash and suggest one big Council for greater Melbourne. This would stifle community groups, with David and Goliath scenario. The more of us there are, the less power and significance each of us has. http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/future-melbourne/committee-for... A “greater Melbourne council” covering the entire city, or a handful of super councils, could be created to deliver rates savings to residents and help the city thrive, Committee for Melbourne boss Martine Letts said. “We believe a new system of local government that creates economy of scale through collaboration is essential for service delivery and sustainability,’’ Ms Letts told the Herald Sun.' This committee of property developers would not suggest anything that was not directly in their interests.

Mat Mitchell (not verified)

Fri, 2017-06-16 16:11

Oh, I think the people are well aware that the temperature of water is already decidely uncomfortable, we just have no idea of what to do about it - our leaders and our elite rich act like an Alien species that will not have to suffer the consequences of what is happening to our society - so from that front there is no hope. So what to do? Unless everyone is prepared to risk life and limb in turning away from our current institutions, i.e stopping participating in them, and creating new, citizen controlled institutions, then things will continually deteriorate until uncontrollable violence and unpleasant lawlessness breaks out (as opposed to the possibly more pleasant wallking away from current system laws, created by the elites, towards real citizen created laws).

George S (not verified)

Wed, 2017-06-14 08:52

Foreign investors obviously would not be getting into Australian property markets if it were not for high population growth. The same goes for any investor, using negative gearing. Those in positions of influence who get quoted in the mainstream media and who blame these factors in isolation from investor-friendly high population growth are being disingenuous. Those who repeat these arguments as though they alone hold the solution to planning woes and unaffordable housing are falling to analyse the situation. Investment is supposed to hold some risk but there is no risk in today's big city Australian property market.

quark

Sat, 2017-06-10 11:33

It is interesting that the GDP per capita graph shows a 14% rise in Australia (and a 43% rise in Estonia which has negative population growth). GDP per capita supposedly a measure of individual wealth does not as far as I know, show how well this is actually distributed throughout the population. Obviously it is a better indicator of how well well off a nation's population might be than is GDP but it could be that a few people are becoming mega- wealthy and others are not benefitting. Furthermore, the most important factor in a nation's well-being is "quality of life". The sorts of things which determine this, in my view, are amount of leisure time, ease of commuting to work, access to nature and other amenity such as sunshine, access to facilities and areas for leisure activities such as sport and recreation, access to affordable medical and other therapeutic as well as educational services. It is my perception that most of these factors have declined in the period mentioned, 2003-15.

quark

Thu, 2017-06-08 08:26

People generally appear to be unaware that rights that they should have are being trampled on.They are sleepwalking to a much diminished future. It is happening just slowly enough for young people and those not yet directly affected not to notice but fast enough for it to look like a juggernaut to the rest of us. It is quite true that the numbers and scale of Melbourne's and Victoria's future, articulated by the Planning Minister on ABC radio the other day would not have been broached 20 years ago. The forces of growth have built up to them so that with each wave of increase of the expectation of Melbourne's future size, the populace is to an extent desensitised and thus the tolerance to the growthist ambitions by the public and the media are ratcheted up. It's an example of the frog expiring in the water as it gradually comes to the boil. (as opposed to jumping out of already boiling water and surviving) If people thought that they actually had rights to be passed on to future generations then they would know if they were being breeched or if they didn't it could be pointed out.

Sheila Newman

Wed, 2017-06-07 22:32

I appreciate your comment on my article, VivKay. It is difficult for people to understand how they might create a new process and to give up entirely on the hand-me-down pretend process we currently have.

Sheila Newman

Wed, 2017-06-07 22:29

Family, friends and all those people Ellen has touched
during her full and fruitful life are invited to attend a
celebration of her life commencing at:

1pm at Ricketts Point, Beaumaris,
(Next to her sculpture Boon Wurrung Blossom)
Wear a splash of blue
Bring flowers from your garden.

VivKay (not verified)

Wed, 2017-06-07 17:22

The public have been complacent and compliant so far in allowing property developers and other industries to assume they can use our established suburbs, change them, for their own vested interests. We might accept *some* population growth, natural growth, at some point in time. BUT, what we have now is our cities being flooded by people, for "diversity", specifically to keep up the Great Housing Ponzi scheme flowing with profits that rise to the top! Great to see a model of protest, and their Rights established. Unless residents become self-determining and authoritative, the rort will continue and our heritage buried under high density housing, endless towers and apartments. Quality of life is diminishing and Planning Backlash can set a standard, and process and a model that can be copied, used and implemented in other suburbs, cities and States!

James Sinnamon

Wed, 2017-06-07 04:14

It's unfortunate that Pearl Harbour is included above as an example of the United States government lying to its people to justify war. Whilst it is true that President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's (FDR's) claim that he was surprised by the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour was a lie, it should not be included in this list. FDR realised months before Pearl Harbour that if the United States did not enter the war then raging in Europe, particularly after 22 June 1941 in the Soviet Union, then Hitler would win the war and humanity would descend in to a new age of barbarism. Unlike the case for all the other wars listed above, all of humanity, including the people of the United States, had a vital stake in the outcome of that war. However, given that there were powerful vested interests in the United States that sided with Hitler, FDR could not see how the United States' people, rightly angry about the needless First World War slaughter, including the loss of 117,000 American lives, were going to be convinced by reasoned argument in sufficient time to prevent Hitler's triumph. President Roosevelt saw no choice but to pull a stunt somewhat similar to the stunts previously pulled to overcome opposition to past unjust wars. That stunt was to provoke Japan into launching a surprise attack. He did so by imposing sanctions on Japan. Japan was then engaged in a vicious war of conquest against China. Without raw materials including oil, Japan would be left with two choices: 1. abandon its war against China; or 2. launch a war of conquest to gain the necessary raw materials from South-East Asia. The Japanese rulers chose the latter course and, at the outset of that war, they attempted to knock out the bulk of the United States' Pacific Fleet including the aircraft carriers USS Enterprise, USS Lexington and USS Saratoga. However, the attack was expected, all the more so, because the Americans had cracked the code used by the Japanese navy to encrypt their radio communications. The devastation caused by the 'surprise' Pearl Harbour attack was considerable: 4 battleships sunk 15 other ships damaged, 188 aircraft destroyed and 2,403 lives lost, but the Japanese failed to sink the three aircraft carriers which had not yet arrived at Pearl Harbour. These aircraft carriers were to play critical roles in the subsequent naval war against Japan in the Pacific. Pearl Harbour gave FDR overwhelming public support for the war against Japan, but not yet for war against Nazi Germany. Four days later on 11 December, fortunately, Nazi Germany, decided to declare war on America. No doubt this was spurred on by United States' warships attacking U-boats and the sendng of Lend-Lease aid to the embattled British Isles as well as Pearl Harbour. The above is documented in a number of works, including "Day of Deceit" (2001) by Robert Stinnett. It is my view that the seemingly cynical underhanded actions of FDR may well have made the difference between the triumph of Nazism and its defeat. Had the US not entered the war, even the heroic sacrifice of the peoples of the Soviet Union may not have stopped Hitler. Without military campaigns of the United States against Nazi Germany and without material supplies from the United States, would the Soviet people have been able to make the further additional sacrifice that was necessary to defeat Nazi Germany, on top of the 25 million that they did lose? I think it unlikely.

Sheila Newman

Fri, 2017-06-02 16:30

We at Candobetter.net offer our condolences to Dr Joe Toscano on the loss of his wife of many years.

Ellen died at 5:17am on Friday 2nd June 2017, aged 66

Wife to Dr Joseph Toscano.
Mother to Cheryl, Benjamin, Libera and Joshua. Grandma Aka to Madison and Eli.

Ellen died peacefully surrounded by her husband and children at Cabrini Hospital, Malvern after a 40 year battle.

A respected Torres Strait Island Elder who has lived in Melbourne for over 40 years. An internationally acclaimed visual artist, educator, anarchist, radical activist and tireless social justice campaigner. She will be missed by her husband, children, grandchildren, friends and all those she has touched during her full and fruitful life.

James Sinnamon

Thu, 2017-06-01 21:34

From Australia Rolls out the Red Carpet for Arizona Reptile John McCain (1/6/17) | Russia Insider :

David MacIlwaine

John McCain says Putin is a greater threat to global security than his Islamist mates in the Middle East

Following a news bulletin in which it was announced with due solemnity that MI5 would be investigating whether it may have "missed" information related to the Manchester bomber, the ABC screened an interview with the very person who could have provided some – John McCain (see Vladimir Putin a bigger threat than Islamic State, John McCain says (29/5/17) | ABC News).

By chance McCain is visiting Australia this week, talking to Government ministers and media and giving a presentation on US policy at Sydney University. He is, they say – ‘Australia's favourite US senator' – and is seen as a useful intermediary in dealing with the difficult Trump administration.

Given this strange perception of one of the neo-cons'' chief war-strategists and trouble-makers, it might not be a real surprise that the ABC interviewer failed to ask McCain what he could tell us about "the Libyan Connection". It is even possible that Leigh Sales – a sensible and experienced commentator who spent years in the US as the ABC correspondent – didn't know that this was a question she could ask, and in fact really needed to ask.

…

Sheila Newman

Wed, 2017-05-31 07:36

Dr Tim Anderson has been threatened to be sacked by the University of Sydney where he works as an academic for denouncing their treatment of Jay Tharappel, Tutor, and also for denouncing their guest's, Sen John McCain, link to Al-Qaida. John McCain's trip to Australia was sponsored by the University of Sydney US Studies Centre in conjunction with News Limited (Murdoch's press) and the Australian Govt. https://www.ussc.edu.au/events/an-address-by-senator-john-mccain

Olive Bax (not verified)

Tue, 2017-05-30 18:46

Thank you for keeping the knowledge of JFK's importance to peace and democracy alive, James. I think you have written about him every year on this date. You are right to say that the mainstream media will continue to try to bury his good works.

John Bentley (not verified)

Tue, 2017-05-30 09:29

I agree with you Geoffrey, wholeheartedly. However, before any elections take place we need to do our homework and then put our homework into action. The homework consisting of informing and recruiting those opposed to massive population increase and the footwork in the form of rolling protests. Until that happens the government (Labour and Liberal), corporate Australia and the mainstream media will take no notice of our lament!

Geoffrey Taylor

Tue, 2017-05-30 01:20

What can adding 5 million more residents to Melbourne by 2050 possibly do for Melbourne's current 5 million residents? Melbourne is already terribly overcrowded and congested. Clearly, moving so many people to Melbourne over 13 years can only cause massive harm to Melbourne's current inhabitants.

Paraodoxically, a small minority stands to perversely gain by destroying the quality of life of most other Melbourne residents. Also, given that many of the new residents will be priveleged members of poor Third World countries, their moving to Australia can only add to the transfer of wealth out of those poor countries into the pockets of Australian developers as well as to support their own anticipated more affluent lifestyles.

This plan to so drastically change Victoria was never put to Victorian voters at the last state election of 29 November 2014. Neither Premier Daniel Andrews nor Planning Minister Richard Wynne have any mandate to proceed with this insane plan. If they fail to abandon this plan, they should resign and call new elections.

Olive Bax (not verified)

Sat, 2017-05-27 22:21

Yes, it amounts to a conspiracy. The property lobby and both political parties have huge land-holdings and shares in property finance and they run, via their governments, the state land packaging. They have urged mass immigration and disorganisation of local government until they figure the citizens simply cannot fight back. It's the British way, as in Hong Kong. Take a fishing village, fill it with immigrants, submerge the original inhabitants, make zillions through land speculation and gambling, then hand it over to the Chinese to chew over the remainder. Australians need to realize they are ruled by a class of people in government and corporations who don't identify with the rest and think they can do what they like. They will use violence against us to make us kow tow, mark my words.

VivKay (not verified)

Sat, 2017-05-27 15:56

"Mr. Wynne replied that he had so many people to fit in! He mentioned over 127,000 in a year and a future population of 10 million. " So there's a definite target to reach 10 million by mid century? That's a plan we haven't really been informed about, and it's never been debated or voted on democratically. Just what will be achieved by millions more people in our cities that isn't being achieved now? Just how will jobs be created, or will the "migrants make jobs"? This growth is just zombie growth, with no real focus or plan except to perpetuate more housing, mortgages, and give a never-ending customer base to big businesses. The Plan for Melbourne keeps being upgraded and changed, and there's no real plan except GROWTH and the struggle of damage-control - and giving the public the illusion we are protected from over-development when it's simply released incrementally!

Student at Law (not verified)

Fri, 2017-05-26 20:07

Ken Alderton questions Roy but then offers his own unsubstantiated assertions using unknown HC justices as reference to add authority, and doesnt qualify if still on the bench or retired. I find it difficult to believe their Honours would dismiss omission of evidence such as figerprints as not material to the case. Dubious. There are many such cases in Australia where the High Court has held the need to provide all available evidence to test the criminal charges against the accused. Also Ken says his sources confirm ulterior motives for requesting close TV footage. I was starting to think that Roy and Ken are same person, just two different days where personalities alternate. More meds I think.

Sheila Newman

Fri, 2017-05-26 18:18

It was really dramatic. It sounded to me as if Wynn was desperately screaming something like, "But Melbourne will reach 10m in fifty years!" As if he had a gun to his head. And I thought it was amazing that the interviewer didn't say, "WHAT???!!! Are you insane? Who tells you that?" And then make that the subject of the interview. But Rafael Epstein just bumbled on as if developers were not at war with the people of Melbourne. Does the cost of living and the high rate of unemployment ensure that most people with a job, especially in planning or the mainstream media, never speak out? Because most people depend on them. And, you know, one could ring in, but the liklihood is that you will be kept hanging on line and, if you really know what you are talking about, they won't let you on. (Well, it's true that I once had an hour spaaing with ex-Premier Steve Bracks, on the conversation hour, but afterwards somehow, the comments page that was published to accompany that episode, was permanently dysfunctional so almost no-one could ever post on it - and I know that many tried. http://www.abc.net.au/local/audio/2010/04/19/2876868.htm

Simone (not verified)

Fri, 2017-05-26 17:01

I have just listened to the Victorian Planning Minister talking on ABC radio about the new planning rules allowing a huge increase in dwellings per unit of land e.g 20 are now where 1 might have existed originally and 2 were allowed under the previous rules in what are called Neighbourhood Residential Zones (the most amenable zones all over Melbourne). The program host Raphael Epstein asked the Minister, Richard Wynne why he sounded so angry as he dismissed the complaints of the Mayor of Boroondara aired immediately prior. Mr. Wynne replied that he had so many people to fit in! He mentioned over 127,000 in a year and a future population of 10 million. Who is telling him he has to fit them in I wonder. How can he plan sensibly with such unreasonable targets? Planning becomes formulaic or an exercise in geometry rather than in liveability.

John Bentley (not verified)

Thu, 2017-05-25 09:49

Unfortunately, I don't believe we live in a democracy. We seem to be living some sort of cross between an oligarchy and a plutocracy with a bit of autocracy thrown in for good measure.

Greg (not verified)

Wed, 2017-05-24 16:34

How can we possibly accept populism within a democracy? Ummmm... because that, essentially, is the nature of democracy? Not 'New Improved Democracy'! Faster and cleaner than the real thing. And so, so convenient. There's no need to think - we have experts who'll do that for you. Just relax. Actually the elite will do that for you too. You get back to your work and worry. The rent and utilities won't pay themselves, y'know. It could be worse - you could have to work at the 457/11

Sheila Newman

Mon, 2017-05-22 18:42

It is a great source of anxiety and grief to me when I go into my front or back yard to think that the whole thing might be destroyed by bulldozers and to imagine the distress of the birds and small animals who have found refuge here for many generations. It seems that what the Victorian State Government is organising is tantamount to war against Victorian citizens and nature. I cannot imagine how it has come to this, except through capitalism, which seems to reward the powerful with almost direct lines to money-making so that they repeat certain actions again and again to ensure more money, like so many rats focusing on pellet rewards for repetitive actions, or pokie-addicts pulling the lever. Examples of ways to milk the increasing public herd either privately or publicly are constant road building, suburb construction, rent from high rise parking lots, toll roads, mass production of disposable items to cause continuous repurchase, and weapons sales for wars, always engendering the need and desire for more. And these criminal scams are normalised in our society through the mainstream press, which is like a multi-stream vehicle manipulating the market for those able to exploit and become addicted to simplistic exploitative scams.

quark

Mon, 2017-05-22 17:30

If the rate of demolition and redevelopment accelerates as these plans indicate, especially with the fence to fence cavernous excavations for underground garages then apart from all the loss of trees directly from demotion sites I cannot see how how trees in nearby gardens or street trees wilt be able to survive. I think we will notice a huge loss of suburban wild life especially birds over the coming months and years. How can it not be so?

quark

Mon, 2017-05-22 17:18

The word "populist" is used disparagingly, throughout the mainstream media. One gets the strong idea that it is wrong for a politician to represent or for a writer to express "populist"views i.e prevailing views held by a significant number of people but which don't accord with the current political mainstream narrative. Why would it be "wrong"? It could be said that it "wrong" because a potential leader should be leading the way as should a good writer, commentator. Leading where? Leading people to a higher level of discourse, I suppose. But if this higher level cannot be identified or is found only to serve a group separate from the masses, then why should it have priority over an idea described as "populist"? The interpretation of the will of the people by government or media is a mark of democracy; ignoring it or denigrating it is tyranny.

Henny Penny (not verified)

Tue, 2017-05-16 14:48

I heard on the Melb ABC today that the will be a conference of planners in Melbourne today and their main topic will be to make apartment living more appealing since people can no longer afford houses with gardens. A female participant was interviewed who made it clear that was Melbourne's destiny. Next in another segment I heard someone mention the word "community". I thought well there will be no "community for people living in clusters of large scale high rise.

quark

Fri, 2017-05-05 08:45

With their beautiful cheeses, wines and general cuisine, it is amazing that anyone would try that on the French and expect them to swallow the line "France has no culture". It's been used on Australians for about 20 years and they guilelessly embrace it!

Simone (not verified)

Fri, 2017-05-05 08:23

I have been taking quite an interest in the elections in France,following the televised French news on SBS for some weeks. People in Australia I speak to about it are under the impression that Marine le Pen is "far right" and no wonder as she is constantly described as such in the media. One friend even described Macron to me as "left wing"! Macron would not even describe himself as "left wing". I think he calls himself a "centrist". Surely these descriptions are the wrong way around? There is nothing in le Pen's utterances that I could describe as "right wing". This mis-labelling creates in those with only a passing acquaintance the impression that Marine le Pen is "bad" and that Macron is the only alternative. Even avowed feminists of my acquaintance normally well disposed towards a female candidate (all things being equal , of course) dismiss le Pen as "far right".

Sheila Newman

Thu, 2017-05-04 23:32

I live in a suburb 50km from Melbourne CBD. Sometimes I fly to Brisbane. It is actually faster and easier to fly from Brisbane to Melbourne than to get from Melbourne to my suburb, although there is a train direct from the city. Steve Bracks' name will ever be mud or worse for having promised a train to the airport. What liars these politicians are. They do not work for us. You have to take a bus to Southern Cross, then a train to Flinders, then a train to my suburb, then a taxi up the hill after 7pm because there are no buses after 7pm, although this is a 'transport hub' where they are planning on building up for hundreds of thousands. You could take the airport bus, but that can take 3 hours to make the trip, at some cost. Or you could drive, but you have to give yourself an hour or more for traffic jams and pay for a tollway or brave the heavy traffic on the ring-roads, and the cost of parking near the airport (within walking distance) is totally prohibitive, only equaled by the cost of parking when you go to visit someone in a suburban hospital these days. As for meeting someone 25k away, it takes 40 minutes. The best bet is to meet a friend half-way. Meetings of environmental or other activist groups, if they have interests that go beyond one suburb can take your whole day, much of it in traffic.

VivKay (not verified)

Thu, 2017-05-04 11:26

" Macron's ridiculous statement that 'France has no culture' seems overtly anti-France and smacks of economic rationalist slogans we have heard in Australia. " Surely France has been a focus of European culture, leading the way with secular government, tolerance of the persecuted, and in the arts, architecture, language, history and food? Just like in Australia, without "culture" or values, it's an easy path to globalization, and cultural destruction through mass immigration.

John Bentley (not verified)

Thu, 2017-05-04 11:19

Thanks for article Sheila, it's been put together really well. I have a sister Leah who lives in Pascoe Vale, a mid-northern suburb of Melbourne, and according to her the traffic slows around 1.00am but only moderately for about 4 hours. She and another sister Liz had to take my niece Nina at the airport from Pascoe Vale and a trip that should only take 20 minutes took them best part of an hour on a Sunday evening. Personally I don't drive to or in Melbourne anymore as I prefer public transport although unreliable beats the hell out of driving and parking. Unless you're trying to get to the airport, of course!!

quark

Thu, 2017-04-27 21:36

This operation would ruin the ambience of this tranquil area. It is the first place most people would visit on arrival at Tidal River camping are. It needs to reman underdeveloped, non -commercial and wild. Please , Parks Victoria , leave Victorians this place to restore our sanity on our escape from Mad Melbourne.

Sheila Newman

Thu, 2017-04-27 13:02

ABC currently has a listener survey running. Consider taking the opportunity to complain about their appalling bias re reporting and 'educating' on population growth. Perhaps ask them to stop promoting commercially invested people like Bernard Salt and the Property Council of Australia or State Ministers to justify population growth as if they were scientific. They need to allow ordinary people to say what they think of the problem and they need to link the on-the-ground effects of population growth to the policy, since people often fail to realise what is driving all the traffic etc. Go to http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/ and look for the yellow “Your Space” box in the right margin. There are two open questions near the end: "What would you like to hear more of on [whatever stations you've said you listen to]" and the next question asks what you'd like to hear less of.

Sheila Newman

Thu, 2017-04-27 12:56

ABC currently has a listener survey running. Consider taking the opportunity to complain about this appalling bias re war reporting, which is doing as much damage as Hitler ever did.
Go to http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/ and look for the yellow “Your Space” box in the right margin.

There are two open questions near the end: "What would you like to hear more of on [whatever stations you've said you listen to]" and the next question asks what you'd like to hear less of.

There is an open question near the end, What would you like to hear more of on [whatever stations you've said you listen to].

I posted:
"Recognition of the role of population growth in a wide range of problems, from housing unaffordability, under-employment, urban design and infrastructure to environmental stresses and climate change, to international conflicts and flows of asylum-seekers. The constant omission, or dismissal as racist and anti-multicultural, of basic factual relationships, is frustrating - not least because it causes quite futile "solutions" to be peddled, addressing symptoms but not underlying causes."

The next question asks what you'd like to hear less of - some of you might have things to suggest there.

Mary Unde (not verified)

Tue, 2017-04-25 09:18

Thank you for pointing people to the entire Assad interview. I noticed that 4Corners did an editing job on an interview with Assad where he quipped that he had not been in the prisons but rather "in the presidential palace" and then he laughed and then the recording was cut. What offensive editing! I couldn't tell if the bodies were real or not. It seemed to be told through one or 2 people- the woman whose son was killed 6 days after being taken prisoner and the guy who had made it to Europe. Obviously and tragically, 4Corners, which I once admired as reliable reporting with a conscience, has become a propaganda vehicle in this most dangerous of times.

admin

Mon, 2017-04-24 20:28

ABC's Four Courners in a few minutes will be presenting Syria's Disappeared - The case against Assad. The promotion for the program states:

This powerful film shines a light on the barbarism of the Syrian regime at a time when the future of President Assad is being argued over by the world's most powerful nations.

I wait to see if any supporters of President Bashar al-Assad will be interviewed to get their point of view.

Olaf (not verified)

Mon, 2017-04-24 05:18

Originally published in Canberra Times on 23 April under the title, "Stop the goats". The end of the 457 visa program, while welcome, is a distraction from bigger immigration issues. Australian residents' access to jobs, housing and adequate infrastructure is most impacted by the historically high permanent immigration quota, yet there is no word that this will be moderated. While the list of jobs eligible for temporary workers has been culled of trivia such as goat herders and antique dealers, it is unclear whether the visa changes will improve prospects for graduate nurses and engineers. Our low-skilled school leavers, seeking work in warehouses and convenience stores, are more likely to be gazumped by foreign students, usually illegally exploited. Farmers claim that they need foreign workers to fill seasonal jobs, yet the government's harvest-jobs advertising facility remains virtually unused. Unless the immigration changes reduce Australia's population growth, infrastructure crowding, underemployment and household debt levels will only escalate. [It is] time for root-and-branch changes, not window-dressing. Jane O'Sullivan, Chelmer, Qld

Geoffrey Taylor

Sat, 2017-04-22 21:18

Originally published on RT as a CrossTalk debate Pentagon Rules (21/4/2017). The copy embedded below is from YouTube.

Who rules? For decades the imperial presidency has steadily grown in power. Wars today are named after presidents. Trump appears to be going a step further - now the military is being given latitude to conduct its own conflict around the globe.

CrossTalking with Michael Vlahos, Medea Benjamin, and Robert Naiman.

Greg W (not verified)

Sat, 2017-04-22 12:30

This article was published in 2013, but you wonder what has changed. My guess is nothing. It seems obvious that Australia's government institutions are increasingly thumbing their noses at all notion of patriotism, security, fairness and due process.

Non-existent man granted leave to buy $598,000 house
Mar 27, 2013 by Chris Vedelago

Rules governing foreign ownership of Australian real estate have been proved a farce after authorities granted a fictional person leave to buy a $598,000 Melbourne house.

It took less than one business day for the Foreign Investment Review Board to sign off on a pending purchase in Vermont South by “Chodley Wontok”, a non-existent Russian national with a non-existent Australian visa.

“You can imagine my surprise when the email showed up saying I was allowed to buy the property,” said the applicant behind the stunt, who asked for his real name to be withheld. “The system is a joke.”

The stunt has exposed a potentially serious breach in the review board’s online application system, OREN, which was introduced in 2011 and is designed to streamline the process and lower compliance costs for the government.

“I used a fake name, fake address [in Russia], fake passport number and just copied the visa subclass I needed directly off [the board’s] website,” the applicant said. “They didn’t check a single detail. It’s an utter sham. It’s a fraud.”

The applicant said he decided to test the system because he had concerns that the property market was being “gamed” to the detriment of young Australian buyers and that the review board was a “regulatory black hole”.

Under rules introduced in April 2010, temporary residents are permitted to buy existing homes in Australia but must receive prior approval from the board and sell the property before their departure. Permanent residents are exempt.

As part of the new regime, the government also announced it would create a national data-matching compliance monitoring program that would cross-reference applications and immigration and land title records in a bid to catch out cheats.

“Frankly, whatever the rules have been in the past we haven’t had a sufficiently tough compliance and checking program to ensure whatever rules we had were actually enforced,” then assistant federal treasurer Nick Sherry said.

“The compliance regime being announced today is very tough. It’s far tougher than Australia has ever had.”

The Chodley Wontok application was submitted: Read more here: https://www.domain.com.au/news/nonexistent-man-granted-leave-to-buy-598000-house-20130327-2gu0p/

Geoffrey Taylor

Fri, 2017-04-21 00:46

I think the more pessimistic hypothesis given above in the paragraph Deep state victim is the most plausible of the hypotheses in Sheila's article. Paul Craig Robberts' grim appraisal is perhaps still better.

The following is from from his article President Trump's Disappearance (20/4/17):

In my long experience in Washington, vice presidents did not make major foreign policy announcements or threaten other countries with war. ...

But yesterday the world witnessed Vice President Pence threaten North Korea with war. “The sword stands ready,” said Pence as if he is the commander in chief.

Perhaps he is.

Where is Trump? As far as I can tell from the numerous emails I receive from him, he is at work marketing his presidency. Once Trump won the election, I began receiving endless offers to purchase Trump baseball caps, T-shirts, cuff-links, coffee mugs, and to donate $3 to be entered into a raffle to win some memorabilia. The latest offer is a chance to win one of "personally signed five incredible photographs of our historic and massive inauguration." ...

...

As a result of Trump’s failure to govern his own government, we have VP Pence telling Russia and China that there could be a nuclear exchange on their borders between the US and North Korea. Although Pence is not smart enough to know, this is not something Russia and China will accept. (emphasis added)

...

John Bentley (not verified)

Sat, 2017-04-15 12:34

"What did Tarzan say when he saw the elephants coming with sunglasses on"? He didn't say anything because he didn't recognise them! Which sums up the attitude of the Australian political parties at all levels, of all persuasions and the mainstream media when it comes to our overpopulation crisis!!

Dennis K

Fri, 2017-04-14 09:56

I notice this when a lot of issues are discussed. The political class doesn't have that ability to follow a particular train of thought and enquiry. It's just about moving from talking point to talking point. Labor are beginning to push NG reform as part of their platform, so they will just use any opportunity to push their platform. The LNP the same. Nothing ever gets fixed because there is no will to even EXAMINE the problem, let alone solve it. None have decided that attacking the ponzi is part of their brand, so I guess they figure why discuss it? I really am beginning to think democracy just doesn't work. If the issue isn't one parties have on their program, they'll refuse to discuss it because it doesn't promote their campaign.

James Sinnamon

Thu, 2017-04-13 12:42

The comment below was posted to the Flattr blog in response to the article about Flattr having recently, on 5 April, being bought out by Addblock Plus. Flattr is a system to provide any Internet user with an easy way to make a small payment to any creator of content - textual, graphic, video, visual or audio - that he/she sufficiently appreciated. It was launched in March 2010.

It's obvious to me that, two years since I joined Flattr, contrary to my hopes and to what was predicted by its creators, Flattr has made little noticeable impact on the Internet.

Instead of deriving adequate income through Flattr, each content provider still has to struggle to attract advertising to his/her site or go without income.

Those, who are not advertisers, who want to support web content producers are still obliged to use older means: credit cards, PayPal, direct deposit from bank accounts, etc.

Surely, it's time that the creators of Flattr ask themselves why it has not taken off.

The reason I no longer use it is that (as I recall) a Flattr users must commit himself/herself to paying a fixed amount each month.

Why?

Why not just make a payment and only have to pay more when it runs out?

What if one stops using the Internet for a period of time? What if over a given mopnth one one is unable to find sufficient content that he/she judges to be worth a Flattr payment?

Under the existing business model one just has to just keep on paying a fixed amount each month, regardless.

Sheila Newman

Sat, 2017-04-08 18:39

Honolulu, HI—Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard (HI-02) released the following statement today after the U.S. launched military strikes on Syrian government targets:

“It angers and saddens me that President Trump has taken the advice of war hawks and escalated our illegal regime change war to overthrow the Syrian government. This escalation is short-sighted and will lead to more dead civilians, more refugees, the strengthening of al-Qaeda and other terrorists, and a possible nuclear war between the United States and Russia.

“This Administration has acted recklessly without care or consideration of the dire consequences of the United States attack on Syria without waiting for the collection of evidence from the scene of the chemical poisoning. If President Assad is indeed guilty of this horrible chemical attack on innocent civilians, I will be the first to call for his prosecution and execution by the International Criminal Court. However, because of our attack on Syria, this investigation may now not even be possible. And without such evidence, a successful prosecution will be much harder.”

James Sinnamon

Fri, 2017-04-07 22:56

Geoffrey, I think the pessimistic outlook, apparently held by you and Pauk Craig Robets, may not be entirely warranted. There are reports that the Russians are more respolved to prevent further US meddling in Syria following this act of aggression ordered by the President Trump.

See, for example, Moscow suspends US-Russian memorandum on flight safety over Syria

...

"It is obvious that the strike with US cruise missiles had been prepared beforehand," the Russian Foreign Ministry said. "It is clear to any specialist that the decision to deal the strikes was made in Washington before the events in Idlib, which were used as a pretext for a show of muscle. It is beyond doubt that the US military strike is an attempt to distract attention from the situation in Mosul, where as a result of actions by the US coalition hundreds of civilians died and the humanitarian disaster is growing."

The Russian Foreign Ministry has more than once declared its readiness for cooperation in tackling burning problems of today, including the struggle against international terrorism.

"But we will never agree to illegitimate actions against the legal Syrian authorities, who have for a long time been involved in irreconcilable war on international terrorism," the statement runs.

...

Geoffrey Taylor

Fri, 2017-04-07 22:09

from Trump has surrendered. Will Putin be the next to surrender? (6/4/17) by By Paul Craig Roberts

Update: Washington has reopened the conflict with a Tomahawk missile attack on Syrian Air Force Bases. The Russian/Syrian air defense systems did not prevent the attack.

The Washington Establishment has reasserted control. First Flynn and now Bannon. All that are left in the Trump administration are the Zionists and the crazed generals who want war with Russia, China, Iran, Syria, and North Korea.

There is no one in the White House to stop them.

Kiss good-bye normalized relations with Russia.

The Syrian conflict is set to be reopened. That is the point of the chemical attack blamed by Washington on Syria despite the absence of any evidence. It is completely obvious that the chemical attack is a Washington orchestrated event. According to reports US Secretary of State Tillerson has warned Russia that steps are underway to remove Syrian president Assad. Trump agrees.

The removal of Assad allows Washington to impose another Washington puppet on Muslim peoples, to remove another Arab government with an independent policy from Washington, to remove another government that is opposed to Israel’s theft of Palestine, and for Exxon’s Tillerson and the neoconservative hegemonists to cut Russian natural gas off from Europe with a US controlled gas pipeline from Qater to Europe via Syria.

By ignoring all of these US advantages, the Russian government dithered in completing the liberation of Syria from Washington-backed ISIS. The Russians dithered, because they had totally unrealistic hopes of achieving a partnership with Washington via a joint effort against terrorism. (emphasis added)

... read more

John Bentley (not verified)

Fri, 2017-04-07 09:34

I too got a point horribly wrong Matthew (read egg on face) - the book by Peter North is titled "Growing for Broke" not as I alluded "Going for Broke"!!

Matthew Mitchell

Wed, 2017-04-05 09:32

Thanks John, I understand your point - but your assumptions about my work history I think you will find are quite wrong, not that I think my work history is at all relevant to what I am saying. I am not saying that women were not treated poorly in the past. I am just saying that the current situation is incredibly difficult for many of us, and it is going to take a lot of digging deep for us to manage in this stressful environment without exploding at each other occassionally. Chesterson also does not say that women have not been oppressed, but what he says is that they are probably more oppressed when expected to compete with men in the work place and also do all the other duties expected of women - and which realistically someone has to do (someone has to raise children, feed them dinner, wash their clothes etc). As for the situation of women in our recent past. I believe both men and women have been treated abmominably in different ways. Men's lives for most of industrial history were treated as disposable - both in war in peace. The truth is - and I think we may agree on this - the system is fundamentally unsustainable, but I believe it is harder now than it was when I was a boy. I am fully aware of the 'Big Picture' but in the meanwhile we all have to live from day-to-day until this system collapses - as it seems is already happening, and that will not make life more pleasant either - so again we will need a great degree of forebearance with each other to ride this out. That is my essential message here. Take it or leave it. Matt

John Bentley (not verified)

Tue, 2017-04-04 10:59

Bit of a mouthful there Matthew, let's try and dissect your problems as best we can. Before we go any further I must inform you that I haven't heard of Chesterton let alone read him. Keith Reid and Gary Booker on the other hand did inform me that life was like a bean stalk, so I guess we'll just have to suck it and see. As a young bloke I was brought up in the more or less traditional family home in the outer suburbs of Melbourne. Dad was a works overseer for a local council which while giving him the benefit of a vehicle, he was on call 24/7 unless on holidays. Mum, who wasn't licensed to drive, ran the household raising 8 kids and while it was a struggle we all managed comfortably enough. My parents ability to manage our day to day lives by working diligently, careful planning financially and strategically, was a lesson we children learnt at a young age. As you describe my family were patriarchal like most families of the day. You mention that Chesterton believed that this was shield women with the advent of industrialism to protect them from the demands of work or was it an opportunistic grab for power by industrialists, essentially men, with the sanction of the various religious sects. The repugnant sexist comments: "barefoot and pregnant" and "a woman's place is in the home" ring in my ears to this day! Left overs from a bitter past when women were and still are today, discriminated against courtesy of their gender. Your rant against the modern day work place is pathetic to say the least. Obviously you have never been self-employed, been in a position of responsibility or even worked shift work. The demented idea that we all should have jobs working 9 til 5 and be able to go home and party is a fairy tale that the '50s American economy dreamed up for TV. Life is tough and this type of surrealism doesn't wash, there is more to life outside of paid work and it's called family, community and last of all leisure. For their part employers (read capitalists) have one goal above all others and that is to improve profits. With advent of large corporations (shareholdings) this emphasis on profits was raised to a new level and raised again and again as these companies became national, transnational &c. During this process employees have been marginalised into units of labour, unionism discredited, menial tasks moved off-shore and low paid labour imported from countries that can least afford it. In the meantime, we the electorate, have stood idly by an accepted what has been dished up to us. The middle and lower classes in Australia have been bought off, sucked in, pampered and ripped off until now there is bugger all left. We have no rights, we have no dignity, we have no soul - we've sold the lot! Rather than reading Chesterton Matthew I suggest that read the book "Going for Broke" by Peter North. You may then understand the enormity of what we, as Australians, and the world are facing in the next couple of years. I suggest you stop worrying about the day to day stuff and start looking at the big picture - it ain't pretty!!

Sheila Newman

Sat, 2017-04-01 23:13

One of the ways that state governments, beginning with the Victorian government under Jeff Kennett, managed to disorganise citizens and deprive them of power over the management of their own communities, was to amalgamate local councils and place state employed executives over them. The article below tells of a rare blocking of this trend in Sydney:

"A Victory for Localism in Australia: Court Blocks Forced Amalgamation by Wendell Cox 03/31/2017

In a rare victory for grassroots activists, The New South Wales Supreme Court has blocked the forced local government amalgamation of northern suburban councils Ku-ring-gai and the Shire of Hornsby in Greater Sydney. The Ku-ring-gai Council had challenged the parliamentary order and lost at a lower court level , but as The Daily Telegraph put it “Ku-ring-gai Council has won its appeal against a forced merger with Hornsby Council this morning in a judgment that was highly critical of the State Government delegate and its process.” The Council was also awarded costs.

This forced amalgamation is just one of a number of mergers ordered by the ruling Liberal-National Coalition government of Premier Gladys Berejiklian. This and other such orders have been challenged in court and, according to the Daily Telegraph: “The Berejiklian government's remaining council merger plans have been thrown into upheaval after the NSW Supreme Court ruled the process used ahead of a proposed merger between Ku-ring-gai and Hornsby Councils did not accord with procedural fairness.”

Read more at http://www.newgeography.com/content/005574-a-victory-localism-australia-court-blocks-forced-amalgamation

VivKay (not verified)

Fri, 2017-03-31 11:04

The "growth" addiction is about surrendering to vested interest groups, not general population and voter welfare. Doctors in the medical profession take an oath, the Hippocratic oath, to ensure that their medicines and procedures are for the BENEFIT of the patients, rather than promote diseases! The same sort of oath should be for politicians, that their policies actually BENEFIT the public in general and serve their welfare- and that of future generations. What we have now is they are serving industry groups, such as property developers, banks, "investors", The Economy's growth, but are derelict with environmental standards, human welfare, personal well-being, or any consideration for the future! Policies should benefit the majority, not privileged minorities. There's no public or democratic mandate to keep expanding our cities, or for mass immigration - and even Multiculturalism is wearing thin! It's all about manipulating the public to support high immigration. Economic, legal and social policies all should benefit the majority, not politicians lining the pockets of the elite, and assuming it's all natural! Nothing "natural" about our population boom. Our Constitution needs to be amended so that the public are not manipulated. At the rate we are going, the only home owners will be those inherited from Baby-Boomer parents, or the elite! Living standards are declining, and debts mounting. We lack real leadership in Australia, and the public are too manipulated. An oath that all laws and policies are democratic, and for the benefit of most, should be enshrined in our Constitution.

Dan Germouse (not verified)

Fri, 2017-03-31 03:06

Fluoride is an endocrine disruptor, retard. 2006 US National Research Council report Fluoride in Drinking Water: A Scientific Review of EPA's Standards p 223 "In summary, evidence of several types indicates that fluoride affects normal endocrine function or response; the effects of the fluoride-induced changes vary in degree and kind in different individuals. Fluoride is therefore an endocrine disruptor in the broad sense of altering normal endocrine function or response".

Sheila Newman

Wed, 2017-03-29 11:07

Thank you John, for this comment, which I managed to preserve among a slight decline in spam today with the institution of captchas. Please keep those comments coming. (We have been enduring a massive spam assault and I don't know how many comments we may have lost in the crowd.) As well as Jane O'Sullivan's estimates of dollar costs per immigrant, to which you allude, there are a host of intangibles, which we also need soon to explore again. Such as insecurity, disorganisation, time spent protesting, trying to defend property rights. I'm also thinking of the dual economy where overseas currencies can buy up our property more easily than Oz dollars, exacerbating the rich/poor divide here and its concommitant in multiple house owners vs homeless. People seem to be worrying more about having their homes invaded, houses robbed and crime in general, but when an increasing number of Australians and immigrants have insufficient employment in the mainstream economy, what you have left is the black economy, which power elites are encouraging internationally with wars as well as mass immigration in the still relatively peaceful 'developed world'. So drug cultivation, drug dealing, breaking and entering, reluctant prostitution, murder for hire... We have gone from a country where people literally didn't lock their suburban doors because everyone knew everyone else to one where insurance and security are major employment and investment sectors. This is not "progress".

John Bentley (not verified)

Wed, 2017-03-29 09:47

Thankyou Jill for an excellent expose outlining the problems that Melbourne faces. After reading the editorial in yesterday's Age: http://www.theage.com.au/comment/the-age-editorial/melbournes-growth-a-r... I wrote the following in reply which, of course will never see the light of day: The Editor, The Age editorial says it all “The Age supports population growth. It is one of the main sources of economic wealth an cultural diversity,......” Populations boosters invariably wouldn’t know the economy if they fell over it and know little of economics (economics of the real world) to boot. The phrase “economic wealth” is double speak for their wealth as The Age’s owner Fairfax is a bit more than a dabbler in the property market and property development. The Age also acknowledges that Australia has an infrastructure deficit and any attempt to rectify that deficit will blow the budgets of all governments out of the water. The question then must be asked: Why is this infrastructure deficit increasing? The answer my friends ain’t blowin’ in the wind, it’s because each time a migrant steps off the plane into the Land of Oz, we cough up $178,000! Yes that’s right, 178,000 Oxford Scholars. This is the cost of adding infrastructure to our cities and towns. This is the cost of adding schools and hospitals, extending utilities, roads and rail, housing that nobody can afford and not being able to maintain what we already have. All this, of course, is at the expense of the environment. Not only are we poorer for the efforts of the population boosters, so too is the biota! I fear that while we have successive governments at all levels that bow down to population boosting, a rapacious bank and housing sector and a compliant media, we may be banging our heads against the proverbial wall. Still we must hang in there as I believe we are slowly getting the message across as more people become aware of the problems that overpopulation promotes.

matthew (not verified)

Tue, 2017-03-28 13:05

Did anyone watch Q and A last night (28 March 2017)? Towards the end a young woman in the audience asked if government policies regarding immigration and foreign purchasers in the real estate market were affecting housing affordability for young Australians. Every panel member avoided this suggestion extremely adroitly, even a singer who I'd never heard of. They all played it like poison ball, avoiding the issue, even the singer who uncomfortably declared that his children would probably not be able to get into the housing market. It is more important obviously NOT to mention the "I word" or the "F.O. word" on television than to do something about making sure your own adult children get housed. LETTER IN THE AGE TODAY Dereliction of duty When Treasurer Scott Morrison urges regulators to clamp down on loans to investors in the housing market, he reveals a disturbing trend among governments at federal and state levels – an abrogation of their responsibility. While leaving decisions to an "independent" umpire may shield politicians from unpalatable outcomes (for example, the Fair Work Commission's decision on penalty rates), the public is denied the right to hold responsible the appropriate people. The blame does not lie with public servants or statutory authorities, but politicians. The government has levers to ease pressure in the housing market. We expect it to use them. Ramesh Rajan, Camberwell

VivKay (not verified)

Mon, 2017-03-27 09:51

What profession must make solid strategic plans, and always have to cater for excessive and ad hoc growth? The Plan now really is no Plan, just damage-control and retro-fitting to cope with unplanned growth! How many Plans have their been for Melbourne, all to be amended or superseded? They are shuffling the goal post in an effort not to avert the growth!. It's just ad hoc, mayhem and about appeasing property developers and the mortgage industry. Would there really be any Master Plan that really catered and assessed the needs and values of future generations? We've had population booms in the past, when we had the Gold Rush, 19th century, and the great Post War immigration- but they were not scams that we have now- of "skills shortages"! Now it's growth without a purpose, simply to fill houses - our main industry now!

John Bentley (not verified)

Fri, 2017-03-24 12:16

Thankyou Matthew!! This reminds me of one of those sagas most of us have read about in kids books and comics where the hammer has reached it's zenith and is about to come crashing down! You know it's going to hurt, you know the injuries that are going to be inflicted will be horrific, but you are to stupefied to do anything about. You are like stunned mullet with your eyes transfixed upon the hammer waiting for that crushing blow. This is the Australian housing market! Unable to accept that it's overheated, it steps on the gas with an all too familiar result. Everybody knows that this is the case, but nobody (those who have control of the market - governments, banks, property developers, &c) has the intestinal fortitude speak up, to ameliorate the problem or even batten down the hatches. They don't care! They won't be the ones lining up at the soup kitchens, they've made their money. It'll be the stunned mullets watching the Great Australian Scam unfold.

matthew (not verified)

Thu, 2017-03-23 19:11

Good luck getting better processes around this. See the following:
"reforms to planning laws to curb frivolous or vexatious objections to
high density developments and increased investment in urban transport."

quark

Sun, 2017-03-19 08:20

You can make a case that people are worse off as conditions became more crowded, that life is more costly, that housing becomes less affordable, that the environment is collapsing,that schools and hospitals can't cope, that future power supplies could be problematic, that our great grand children will be born into an overpopulated impoverished environment , but still people are not satisfied unless there is plausible "economic argument" not to go down this path. It's crazy but people seem to care less about their own lives than they do about what they are told is good for them.

Dennis K

Sat, 2017-03-18 16:46

A conversation with a longtime friend has me pondering the nature of the "Globalist vs Nationalist" struggle. Marine Le Pen has stated "It's no longer left vs right but nationalism vs globalism", a sentiment which more accurately describes the key political division of our age. That is not to say that there is no Left/Right divide, but that the more pertinent divide is between a Nationalist style thinking and a Globalist style thinking, and within the Left and the Right, there are divisions between those who are Globalist and those who are Nationalist. Read more

Dennis K

Sat, 2017-03-18 16:40

It is interesting to note that Gareth Aird had to make the point about 'lived experience'. Lived experience is really the only metric that matters! The whole point of having economic growth is to improve peoples lives, but improving their experience of life. That is the point of any human institution or system. Is it not? This is what is lacking when people discuss economic impacts, and its frustrating to see time and time again, that retorts rarely make this the the first and foremost, and only point. The fact that immigrants might improve our economy by growing GDP 0.2% more is irrelevant to any argument, if that additional growth doesn't result in a better life experience. We push for growth, and feel good because the numbers are better, but what about the lived experience? What about the quality of life? Economic growth without a corresponding increased satisfaction and enhanced experience of the living conditions is useless, not worth one jot. Economic growth in Australia today are like healing crystals hanging on the walls. It costs something to obtain, people are prepared to pay to have them, but they make no difference whatsoever, except in allowing that person to argue that we should spend to do the same. When people come to me about economic growth, or how the Liberals are great economic managers, I always ask "How has YOUR life presonally improved. How are you better off, enjoying life more"? Very rare I get a positive response, and the arguments are usually economic, about their house value going up, or less debt. But rare that they can actually tell me how they have more freedom, more spending power, less financial worry. They might say the booming property market is great, but they enjoy their property less as subdivisions go up everywhere and traffic increases. They might say that growth is good, but they complain about the traffic and crowds. They say the income is great, but are worried about government debt, and their own mountain of debt.

VivKay (not verified)

Wed, 2017-03-15 15:01

"RSPCA was recently sued for over $1m in farm losses, which has caused it severe financial problems..." How is the RSPCA meant to look after All Creatures Great and Small and protect them from animal cruelty on farms when so many agricultural practices and norms operate on exploitation and cruelty to animals? It's a zero sum game, of on one hand governments endorsing animal cruelty, and then funding the RSPCA? The institutional cruelty is due to the nature of modern animal husbandry, with mono-cultures of animals, confined and processed in factories? There's no sensitivities when the public are barred from transparency, and the public have no say on how these are run. It's all in secrecy, and with human populations expanding, in what's called "economic growth", it means more high-speed processing of meats and dairy, more procedures without animal welfare and more mouths to feed. The RSPCA end up "sued" for their activities, and being a mouth-piece for animals, when it's profits that rule. Animals are merely parts of the processing of meats, as cheap and as competitive as possible. Also, there's reports that the RSPCA have been donated (bribed?) NOT to speak up against the barbaric halal slaughter of animals- of fully conscious animals having their throats slit open! How can we trust the integrity of the RSPCA? There needs to be a totally independent Minister of Animal Welfare - above politics and vested interests.

Geoffrey Taylor

Mon, 2017-03-13 22:00

The following comment is included in the discussion following the Russsia Insider article Erdogan Calls For International Kebab Sanctions Against Netherlands (12 Mar 2017):

From the more recent linked article, Erdogan Vows to Confiscate Dutch Kebabs in Fearless Tit-For-Tat With Netherlands (13 Mar 17):

Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan knows this is all a cover for a deep, dark Dutch secret; he knows that the Dutch government is jam-packed with 'Nazi remnants and fascists'. (emphasis added)

Has Sultan Erdogan forgotten that, back in January 2016, he, himself praised the Führer of the same Nazis that he is now attempting to liken the Dutch government to?:

Turkey's Erdogan Praises "Hitler's Germany" As Example Of Effective Government (1 Jan 2016) | Zero Hedge

...

Now, as Erdogan pushes to officially transform the Turkish presidency from a figurehead role (obviously Erdogan is anything but a figurehead, but this is about enshrining powers he shouldn't have into law) into a chief executive position, the President is appealing to history. As it turns out, the opposition aren't the only ones who compare the strongman to Hitler.

"There are already examples in the world. You can see it when you look at Hitler's Germany,"Erdogan said on Thursday, when asked whether it was possible to maintain the unitary structure of the state under an executive presidential system. "There are later examples in various other countries," he added, in an apparent effort to soften the blow. (emphasis added)

...

See also Erdogan Praises Hitler: Yet Another Threat Against Russia (5 Jan 2017) | New Eastern Outlook It's No Surprise That Turkey's Erdogan Likes Adolf Hitler's Government (1 Jan 2017) | Huffington Post

quark

Sun, 2017-03-12 13:16

It is so important that the war in Syria comes to a close asap. What is the difference now with Trump's approach as opposed to the one prevailing hitherto?

Olaf (not verified)

Fri, 2017-03-10 12:45

By in Australian Economy

| 24 comments

By Leith van Onselen

ABC’s Lateline last night ran a well-balanced segment examining the economic impacts of mass immigration. The segment featured three guests:

  • ANU professor, Bob Gregory, a pro-immigration economist who has previously claimed
    that the past 12-year’s mass immigration has provided a bigger (and
    more permanent) economic boost to Australia than the mining boom.
  • CBA senior economist, Gareth Aird, who has recently argued that Australia’s mass immigration settings are lowering the living standards of the resident population.
  • Deloitte Access Economics’ Chris Richardson, a pro-immigration economist who has previously called for Australia to lift its already turbo-charged immigration intake.

The segment covered a range of topics, including:

  • Whether immigration is boosting living standards on a per head basis.
  • Whether immigration can prevent Australia’s population from ageing.
  • Deleterious impacts on infrastructure, traffic congestion and housing affordability.

As expected, CBA’s Gareth Aird makes the most sense, noting that the
ordinary citizen is not benefiting from mass immigration and their
‘lived experience’ has deteriorated through sluggish income growth,
deteriorating traffic congestion, and worsening housing affordability.
Aird also calls for governments to take account of these issues, as well
as productivity, when it sets the overall migrant intake, rather than
just focusing on headline GDP growth.

Importantly, Aird also challenges the claim made by Chris Richardson that Australia can “substantially offset” an ageing population by “getting migrants”, noting that this is a temporary fix since immigrants also grow old, and equates to “kicking the can down the road”.

One big positive from the segments is that even pro-immigration
Gregory and Richardson admit that immigration does have negative effects
(which are often ignored) and that “bigger is not better” for
living standards. While vigorously opposing halting immigration
entirely, as advocated by Pauline Hanson, Gregory even acknowledges that
immigration should probably be “adjusted down”.

You know you are winning the debate when pro-mass immigration
economists like Gregory and Richardson will no longer defend current
immigration levels (see below chart).

ScreenHunter_17868 Mar. 10 08.31

It’s now only a matter of time before politicians capitulate and cut
the immigration intake to more sensible and sustainable levels.

unconventionaleconomist@hotmail.com

Sheila Newman

Wed, 2017-03-08 10:56

Kangaroo Killing Results in First Jail Sentence for Cruelty to Animals in Western Australia

Posted on by PETA Australia

Two men have been charged and one sentenced to 11 months in prison after police discovered video footage of the vicious killing of a kangaroo.

After an unrelated raid on a home near Bunbury, Western Australia, police discovered the footage on a seized computer.
In the video, Craig Jamie House and Vance Geoffrey Jarvis corner the kangaroo in a dam, throw rocks at the animal, and then strong>bash the kangaroo with crowbars before dragging the lifeless body out of the water.
House also ordered his dog to help corner the kangaroo.
Both men pleaded guilty to the ill-treatment of an animal. House – who was found to be the instigator – was given an immediate jail sentence of 11
months, while Jarvis was ordered to pay a $10,000 fine.
This kind of punishment is almost unheard of in Western Australia, and RSPCA WA CEO David van Ooran said it was the first known jail sentence imposed in the region for cruelty to animals.
“This is a very strong penalty and a very appropriate penalty”, he added. “[I]t was clearly a horrific and sickening act against a defenceless animal …. It’s excellent to see that the magistrate in this case has awarded a prison term.”
House claimed he killed the kangaroo in
order to eat the animal. As his gun licence was confiscated two years earlier, he used the crowbar instead.
“I tried to put out the ‘roo in the most humanely way I could”, he said.
Magistrate Evan Shackleton dismissed this claim, saying, “For a number of minutes, you were not behaving humanely to that kangaroo”. He added, “In my view, you were having fun tormenting that kangaroo”.
This case comes just weeks after another ground-breaking Australian cruelty case, in which Sydney store Nicholas Seafood Traders received New South
Wales’ first-ever conviction for cruelty to crustaceans.
As in the previous case, this conviction was also achieved using video evidence: a YouTube video showed that a staff member hacked the tail off a lobster and then put the animal through a band saw while still alive.

Margaret (not verified)

Wed, 2017-03-08 10:33

Remember when Andrew MacLeod was the CEO of the Committee for Melbourne and he used to get a lot of media for his pro- population growth message? Haven't heard much from them for a while until the last few days when they instigated the changes to the "walk" signs at the traffic lights for pedestrians so that the walking person symbol was in a skirt to denote that women could also cross on the green light! When I heard this I felt reassured that this harmless exercise could keep the Committee for Melbourne busy. However I just checked their website and their vision for Melbourne remains large- scale. "Global city of choice for people and organisations, due to its distinct blend of prosperity, opportunity and liveability"

quark

Mon, 2017-03-06 15:08

It is public housing in another guise. The caravaners often own their own homes but no land as i understand it. "Replacement" land would need to come with at least the basic services of sewerage and water. Of course governments won't buy it - the idea or the land- any more than they would buy land for a renter tossed out when a house is sold,but perhaps the idea should be put to them since they are stacking the dice against the renters through mass immigration. It would be an extremely costly harm minimisation scheme. Agree re the limits to land but new suburbs are being built to accommodate population growth and there seems to no end in sight. Perhaps if they were obliged to consider making room for displaced people the State Government might send a message to the Federal government to tone down the immigration numbers. Oh well, one can live in hope.......

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