(We) can do better

This discussion on Crosstalk asks whether in the prosecution or persecution of Julian Assange, the western world is seeing the death of journalism. Michael Patchett-Joyce, a barrister specialising in international and European law, brings some new views to the program. John Wight counters with some persuasive political analysis, as does ex-British parliamentarian, George Galloway. The issue of the courts and the 'public good' comes up. John Wight points out that this is an issue of class; the public good is really about the good of the establishment. Galloway says that, if Julian is extradited to the United States, there will be no juries and the US will not feel itself bound to any promises it may have made to Britain in this matter. Patchett-Joyce suggests that the case has a long way to go before a decision can be made about extradition. At no time does anyone mention Julian's cat, but we think this might be a picture of it.

Steven Armstrong is a prospective Sustainable Australia Party candidate for the upcoming federal elections. He has run before and has a history of hard work on the issue of sustainability and the unsustainable problem of our rapid population growth in Australia. His political experience and skill has grown along with his experience. Although Steven has financed previous candidatures, the cost of merely registering to run in the election has suddenly leapt from $350 to $2000 under the LNP coalition. This can only be in order to reduce democratic opposition. So please consider helping Steven in his gofundme campaign! He needs $2000.

Senator Duncan Spender of the Liberal Democrats has criticised the Australian Law Reform Commission’s Review of the Family Law System. “The Review is anti-Dad,” Senator Spender stated.
“Many Dad’s who have lost custody of their children might think that the family law system could not get any worse. Unfortunately they are wrong."

The President of Ecuador, on flimsy pretext, has thrown Julian Assange to the wolves. Today Ruptly footage shows Assange being manhandled by several police from the embassy into a police vehicle. Julian had long hair and a long beard and was shouting, "The UK must resist," and something about "the Trump administration." From somewhere else, the Ecuadorian President delivered a prepared speech to cameras from his wheelchair, stating, among other things, that the UK Government has agreed in writing that Julian would not be sent anywhere he might be tortured or face the death penalty. Wikileaks has said, however, that Assange has been arrested for 'extradition to the United States for publishing'.

Previous research has shown a wide split between elite and non-elite opinion on topics such as cultural diversity, globalisation and immigration. Media professionals and most politicians share these elite views, but large swathes of the electorate do not. The current findings of the survey conducted late in 2018 by The Australian Population Research Institute (TAPRI) on attitudes to immigration and population growth confirm this. They show that the split between elite and non-elite opinion is mirrored in the divisions between voters who are university graduates and voters who are not. This is logical as most elites are now recruited from the graduate class. The gap is wide. Overall 50% of voters want a reduction in immigration. But this proportion rises to 60% of non-graduates while only 33% of graduates agree. (The October/November 2018 TAPRI survey Katharine Betts and Bob Birrell.)

Wednesday, 10 April 2019: A study published in Molecular Psychiatry has identified changes in inflammation-related biochemical pathways in schizophrenia that interfere with proper brain nerve cell communication. Researchers have found the first direct evidence in support of increased kynurenic acid production in the brain, which is known to block a key glutamate receptor. This discovery paves the way for development of better targeted therapies with fewer side effects for people with schizophrenia.

The Duran’s Alex Christoforou and Editor-in-Chief Alexander Mercouris examine the reasons behind Ecuador's Foreign Minister stating that they have no plans of revoking Julian Assange's asylum status.

Dingoes play a key role in the conservation of Australian outback ecosystems by suppressing feral cat populations, a UNSW Sydney study has found. A UNSW Sydney study has ended an argument about whether or not dingoes have an effect on feral cat populations in the outback, finding that the wild dogs do indeed keep the wild cat numbers down.

Video: French demonstrate outside the Australian embassy in Paris, calling for the cowardly unprincipled Australian Government to help Julian Assange. "Where are the 'We are all Charlie' freedom of the press demonstrators?" they cry.

Not so long ago the middle classes were marching enthusiastically all over the western world to defend freedom of the press, after the massacre of journalists at Charlie Hebdo. "We are all Charlie!" they cried. Now there is hardly a peep about Julian Assange's cruel and unusual punishment for telling the world of war-crimes. Certainly no mass marches in the street. What's the difference? The mainstream press is singing a different song. It suited them to have people marching in the streets about Charlie Hebdo. Now, for some reason, it doesn't.

I have just learned, regretfully, of the death of Jay Hanson. My first report was that it occurred in a diving accident. Subsequently it has been clarified that he fell ill after diving, and died that night. Jay Hanson lived in Hawaii. He was the founder of multiple energy resources or peak oil lists from the 1990s, starting with the incredibly popular Dieoff website and DieOff list which looked at peak oil, population numbers, and scarcity. An intermediate list was Killer Ape-Peak Oil. The last list of which we are aware was [America2Point0] which Hanson closed 'until further notice' on 20 December 2016. Hanson was teetotal for many years and studied evolutionary psychology. He believed that humans would be ultimately unable to deal with resource scarcity or human induced climate change because they could not cope with major environmental and evolutionary problems involving themselves.

On Friday 5 April 2019, as revealed by John Pilger on Twitter from a high level source within the Ecuadorian Government, Julian Assange would shortly be expelled from the London Ecuadorian Embassy. Once evicted, he stands to be arrested by the UK police, extradited to the United States where he faces a secret trial based on a secret indictment. He may face many years behind bars - even the death penalty can't be excluded - all for just publishing, through Wikleaks, facts about world events that the public would be entitled to know in a fair and just world.

It is still possible to make the Australian government act to prevent the illegal extradition of Julian Assange to the U.S. and, instead, bring him home to Australia. Should they fail to act, they must be held to account at the forthcoming federal elections.

See also: Be Ready To Act: WikiLeaks Source Says They’re Coming For Assange (5/4/19) by Caitlin Johnstone, The Gestapo Is Coming for Julian Assange (4/4/19) by Paul Craig Roberts.

From CNN And Washington Post Demand That Trump Further Escalate Tensions With Russia (1/4/2019) by Caitlin Johnstone:

Fareed Zakaria says that Donald Trump must now 'prove' that he is not Putin's puppet by risking nuclear war to overthrow Venezuelan President Maduro.

CNN has aired a segment (embedded below within this article) in which pundit Fareed Zakaria tells the network's audience that the US president has "been unwilling to confront Putin in any way on any issue” and asks "will Venezuela be the moment when Trump finally ends his appeasement?" The segment is a near-verbatim reading of Zakaria's Washington Post column from a couple of days prior, so that’s two massive prongs through which this false and pernicious narrative is being driven into mainstream consciousness claiming that the Trump administration has been far too dovish toward Moscow, rather than dangerously hawkish as is actually the case.

Article continues here.

Life-threatening liver disease is skyrocketing in Australia, with alcohol and hepatitis C and now obesity-related fatty liver disease on the rise. The average age of death of these patients is in their mid-50s. Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) affects one in four Australian adults and has been increasing in parallel with the rising prevalence of obesity and diabetes in the community. It is argued that some simple measures, including regular contact with specially trained nurses, can greatly improve outcomes for this chronic condition, which sometimes is poorly understood and mismanaged by patients and their medical and nursing systems. This article comes from a press release from Flinders University, but candobetter.net has included a video about the effects of commercial quantities of fructose on the liver, from Dr Lustig, of the University of California. We spoke to Associate Professor Alan Wigg, Flinders University College of Medicine and Public Health and Head of Hepatology and the Liver Transplantation Medicine Unit, Flinders Medical Centre, who agreed that fructose has a role in the cause of fatty liver. He says that this Flinders University study is particularly looking at how to help people whose liver disease has progressed to an advanced stage.

The Liberian-registered bulk carrier "Anna-Elisabeth" has been detained by Australian authorities after international crew on board a bulk carrier complained of insufficient food, bullying aboard the vessel and denial of shore leave.

Amazing isn’t it? The federal government sets immigration policy. And yet the immigration minister can’t even answer the most simple of questions.

See inside a videoed discussion on the question of Did the French police use excessive force against the Yellow Vests? Criminologist, Xavier Raufer, one of the guests, describes a situation where the French government allows the same violent saboteurs, known to the police, to continually attend Yellow Vest demonstrations and cause havoc. The police response has caused injuries, maimings and deaths, mostly through the use of rubber bullets. President Macron has been criticised by Human Rights organisations and the United Nations, but he persists in allowing career sociopaths to break shop windows and assault people, using this as an excuse for his own extreme violence. The discussion was on the amazing Frédéric Taddeï's show, Interdit d'interdire [Forbidden to forbid] on RT France.

Lib Candidate David Leyonhjelm says Northern NSW koalas are not endangered by logging. Animal lawyer, Angela Pollard, says, "Logging density has doubled, with an extra 140,000 ha of coastal forests targeted for clear-felling. She adds that the previous protections on retaining mature trees have also been removed, and this impacts most severely on the koalas’ main source of food tree. The new logging rules also remove the requirement to check for koalas in the canopy before a tree is felled."

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has released visitor arrivals and departures data for the month of January, which posted record annual permanent and long-term arrivals.

In the year to January 2019, there were 835,310 permanent and long-term arrivals into Australia – up 6% from January 2018 and an all-time high. This was partly offset by 546,310 permanent and long-term departures from Australia:

It looks like youtube has removed this excellent analysis of the New Zealand terror attacks, probably because it criticises the unipolar political perspective of the corporate press and big tech platforms. There is an embed code for the video at Press TV Iran's site, but for some reason it does not work. We will therefore simply link to the press tv site. You can click on the video picture to see the debate.

The Black Alliance for Peace joined activists from peace organizations based in the United States to embark as a delegation to Venezuela to uncover the truth. They are reporting to you on march 15, 2019, the day they were supposed to fly back to the United States. While American Airlines refuses to fly to Venezuela because of so-called danger, this delegation found the embattled country pleasant and safe.

The marches yesterday were really impressive, but there is a way that school children could be many more times effective in carving out their future on these issues. Australian and State governments are pretty resistant against democratic protests, and anyhow, our governments at all levels don't have much of a clue about what to do about providing energy to our increasing populations. Schools and schoolchildren could exert much more pressure and constructive effort at a local level and we hope they will.

"A hundred kangaroos, some dead, others badly injured." Barry Tapp, Senior Inspector for Animal Cruelty Australia Hotline, and other animal rescuers and carers say that the RSPCA failed to respond to requests to deploy the Mobile Animal Vet van to the bushfire areas where it was much needed (notably round Bunyip) and that they thereby failed to honour the commitment they gave the Victorian Government after the Victorian Parliamentary Inquiry into RSPCA Victoria. We publish below the Government Response to that Inquiry. Warriors4wildlife provided the photos via Barrie Tapp.

Mindgardens Neuroscience Network (Mindgardens) has commissioned a white paper on the burden of disease and cost of brain disorders in AustraliaThe burden of all brain disorders in Australia accounted for 20.5 per cent of disability-adjusted life years, nearly twice the global figure of 11.1 per cent illustrating the scale of the health care challenge. The white paper reports the disease burden associated with neurological, mental health and substance use disorders is in excess of $74 billion. Between 2010 and 2017 substance misuse (drugs, alcohol) grew at 24.7 per cent, followed by neurological disorders at 15.6 per cent and mental health disorders by 8.6 per cent.

To keep up with global food demand, the UN estimates, six million ha of new farmland will be needed every year. Instead, 12 million ha are lost every year through soil degradation. Australia lost 36 million ha of agricultural land in just the four years from 2005 till 2009. Some of this lost land has occurred because of urban sprawl which is swallowing up some of our best soils close to cities that used to supply the fresh fruit and vegetables. A scathing report by the Royal Commission has gone as far to accuse the Murray-Darling Basin Authority (MDBA) of negligence and being "incapable of acting lawfully," apparently because they overestimated the amount of water returned to the river by a factor of ten.