The amazing, surprising, Africa-driven demographic future of the Earth, in 9 charts
The United Nations Population Division, which tracks demographic data from around the world, has dramatically revised its projections for what will happen in the next 90 years. The new statistics, based on in-depth survey data from sub-Saharan Africa, tell the story of a world poised to change drastically over the next several decades. Most rich countries will shrink and age (with a couple of important exceptions), poorer countries will expand rapidly and, maybe most significant of all, Africa will see a population explosion nearly unprecedented in human history.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/07/16/the-amazing-surprising-africa-driven-demographic-future-of-the-earth-in-9-charts
Comments
A symptom of Internet illiteracy?
The following was posted to a forum discussion on JohnQuiggin.com:
A symptom of Internet illiteracy is the frequent use of the catch-phrase "just Google it" rather than supplying an explicit URL to link to the page. An example of this illiteracy follows:
... If you type "above type (sic) secret" into google, the Above Top Secret site comes up as the first link with the blurb:
...
The page linked to previously by Sheila Newman lists 10 known conspiracies which have occurred throughout history (listed on May 24th, 2015 at 01:04 | #11) and nothing about "Aliens and UFOs".
Nothing written by Sheila Newman, here or anywhere else, indicates a belief by her in the "faked Moon landing", the Roswell incident or other bizarre conspiracy theories. To the contrary Sheila, Newman has shown here in great detail (on May 24th, 2015 at 01:04 | #11) why she repudiates such beliefs and 'jt' should stop pretending otherwise.
Galilee Basin coal threatens global life support system
This was posted as a comment about Professor John Quiggin's article Standard Chartered and Galilee (23/5/15):
I am somewhat relieved to learn here here that this project is "financially marginal". Just hopefully, in spite of Tony Abbott's support, it will collapse.
The expansion of coal mining at such a breakneck pace when we face so much uncertainty about the future of our global life-support system ranks in criminality with the starting of the Second World War.
What I posted to my own web site's 'about' page in June 2007, when John Howard was still Prime Minister, may be of interest:
The only fundamental difference between today's globalised civilisation and those earlier failed civilisations that we have discovered fossil fuels formed over tens of millions of years through biological and geological processes under the ground. Instead of treating this endowment as a priceless gift, belonging to this and all future generations of humankind, we have dug up almost half of it in less than 200 years. The consumption of fossil fuels has allowed the world's population to double from 500 million in 1650 to from around 1 billion in 1850 and over the next 150 years to expand again by six and a half to reach today's global population of 6.6 billion. How such a large population is to have its current standards of living maintained, or even be fed once our fossil fuel reserves are exhausted, is uncertain at best.
Forum post: Islam best defended by armies of Syria and Yemen
An excerpt of this article with the the introduction below is to be posted to JohnQuiggin.com
Jane Stillwater was one a number of foreign observers who verified that the Syrian Presidential elections of 4 June 2014, in which President Bashar al-Assad won the overwhelming endorsement of Syrians, were conducted fairly. She and three other observers described the elections at a press conference held at the United Nations on 20 June 2014.
'Moon landing' type conspiracy theories never promoted here
This was posted to a forum discussion on JohnQuiggin.com:
'jt' wrote on May 23rd, 2015 at 08:16 | #8 :
On Prof Quiggin's order I will not argue with James
The 'argument' here ended when you failed to respond to the arguments I put in my post of page 1 of May 20th, 2015 at 16:46 | #54.
Sheila Newman asked me to post the following in response to other content 1 of the abovementioned post by 'jt' (Footnotes have been added by me):
I believe that it is a slur on me to suggest that I am linking to a 'right wing conspiracy site'. It is not obvious to me what the politics of the site were or are, nor are they relevant to my post. The first URL I give under the heading, 'Fantastic Conspiracy Theory analysis site found', gives the URL and cites from it a system for rating the validity of conspiracies that its first poster describes. That is the 'fantastic conspiracy theory'. Nothing under the heading in this comment on candobetter _dot_ net is mine. I am simply quoting what someone called 'Curmudgeon' posted suggesting a system for evaluating conspiracy theories to another site in 2007 (5 years prior to me citing it). The system is half humorous but does attempt to award points for what can actually be proven in a conspiracy theory. The moon landing being faked 'theory' scores a 3 out of 5. 5 is proven. 3 is not proven.
I do not show any particular approval for the moon landing as a hoax theory here. I don't say anything about it. It is possible that 'jt' thought that everything I cited was written by me, but actually none of it was; it was all written by Curmudgeon. Perhaps I could have put it in quotation marks, but 'jt' should have checked whose words he was attributing to me.
Regarding the second URL I cited, I cannot see how my detractor can say this is a UFO site. As far as I am concerned it is not a UFO site and being labelled as someone who apparently thinks a UFO site is great presents me as someone with values that I do not hold. I am an evolutionary sociologist and do not appreciate being portrayed as an enthusiastic endorser of UFOs and moon-landing conspiracies, although I do write on other controversial subjects, but I do this scientifically or journalistically. Furthermore, the slur has been reinforced with the implication that this is how I choose to live my life, as if enthusing over moon-landing conspiracies and UFOs on 'right wing' sites was a major defining quality of my writing. ('jt' writes, "If this is how someone chose to live their life, let them have at it.")
Why is this person targeting me?
The second site I referred to (which my detractor calls a UFO site) was one called, "The Top ten real conspiracies" and lists the following which few would dispute.
- 1/ The Assassination Of Julius Caesar,
- 2/ Nero Fiddles As Rome Burns,
- 3/ The Gunpowder Plot - A Conspiracy Within A Conspiracy,
- 4/ Galileo: The Suppression of Knowledge,
- 5/ The Dreyfuss Affair,
- 6/ The Birth Panama and it's Canal,
- 7/ The Reichstag Fire,
- 8/ The Suez Crisis
- 9/ The Watergate Scandal and
- 10/ The Iran/Contra Affair.
There are over 4000 articles on candobetter _dot_ net, of which a fair proportion have been written or edited by me. There is almost nothing on moon landings 2 and little endorsing right wing stuff. We have numerous writers. It is not a two person blog. I also do cartoons and I sometimes write satire. But the main subject is 'reform in democracy, environment, population, land use planning and energy policy '. If anyone wants to know more about what I really do, they can read about me on candobetter _dot_ node net /node/1882 .
I appreciate being able to clarify on this.
Tim Macknay on May 22nd, 2015 at 20:25,
The words "Warren commission apologist" have been removed. The title of the post is simply "Opposed to investigation of crime?"
Footnotes
1. ↑ For more information, see The "Conspiracy Theory" Label: Powerful Tool of Media Disinformation and Political Discourse (1/4/14) by Professor James F. Tracy | Global Research.
The article includes an embedded 4 minute YouTube video (aslo embedded above) in which Luke Rudkowski confronts Cass Sunstein who was, from 2009 to 2012, Administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs. Sunstein had said, in an article Conspiracy Theories (12/1/08) (in pdf):
What can government do about conspiracy theories? Among the things it can do, what should it do? We can readily imagine a series of possible responses. (1) Government might ban conspiracy theorizing. (2) Government might impose some kind of tax, financial or otherwise, on those who disseminate such theories. (my emphasis - Ed)
2. ↑ Apart from the comment previously linked to, I could find only one other reference to 'moon landings'. That reference is in a comment at /node/2406#comment-6260 cited an article, by Bernard Salt of 2 Jul 2008 on Rupert Murdoch's Australian, which has since disappeared.
The article uses similar techniques to those used above to ridicule people who dispute the official narratives about the murder of JFK, etc.
More huge bombs Yemen - not reported mainstream news
I'm trying to collate articles, documents, even if in Arabic. Please comment if you know more.
https://www.facebook.com/yemen.crisis/posts/466542166845358?fref=nf
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=854333647987693&id=100002331976761&refsrc=https%3A%2F%2Far-ar.facebook.com%2Fshfinews%2Fposts%2F980340311996225&_rdr
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_iz45MZ4QXU&app=desktop
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QCzvcuy9m80&app=desktop
On Sat, May 23, 2015 at 2:44 PM, vanessa beeley wrote:
Probably not a nuclear bomb, no evidence Israeli
Definitely unconfirmed. Not many discussions of this spectacular video, but here is one:
http://www.reddit.com/r/conspiracy/comments/36x5rx/israeli_neutron_bomb_yemen_may_20_2015/
Unconfirmed neutron bomb on Yemen 20 May 2015
Neutron bomb dropped by IAF plane with Saudi markings...
By Gordon Duff and Jeff Smith, Editors
A video received from Yemen, believed to be taken May 20, 2015, of an explosion, when analyzed by nuclear weapons experts is, by very high probability, a neutron bomb that could only have been an Israeli attack. The analysis:
A. Its not a conventional 2k lb bomb. It’s much bigger.
B. Its either a very large MOAB bigger than 4,000 lbs. or; ???? Max weight for an F-15 / 16 is about 2,000 lb payload per bomb rack making the deployment of a MOAB impossible.
C. Its appears to be a small neutron bomb. The size, color, lightning effect and duration of the fire ball being suspended in mid air and the very large mushroom cloud is the main give away. The CCD cameras imaging device was “scintillating” (detecting Neutrons) That is the white pixel flashes in the video. When the photo has white pixel flashes in it, that is because it is being hit by neutrons from the nuclear fireball blast. It overloads the ccd’s electronic circuit producing white flashes.
If the radiation is too high it will burn out the chip. They ha big problems with this in Japan with the Fukushima robots cameras failing due to very high radiation counts.
D. Delivery is most likely by an IDF F-16 with a Saudi paint job on the plane. They are not even hiding their use anymore, they just don’t publicly admit it and the IAEA does nothing or says nothing. That is the true war crime. The UN just ignores it unless the US, France or GB complains…….. Russia and China say nothing.
E. This is now the second known use of nukes in Yemen by Saudi Arabia…………..
Jeff Smith is a nuclear physicist and former IAEA inspector.
Syrian Gov rescues 100s of Palmyra statues with no help
Damascus, SANA-Director General of Museums and Antiquities in Syria
Ma’amoun Abdul-Kareem said on Wednesday that there is a terrorist,
brutal attack by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) to have
control on Palmyra ancient city which is considered one of the most
important cities on UNESCO World heritage.
“ISIS terrorist attack on Palmyra is to revenge on the Syrian society
and civilization,” Abdul-Kareem told SANA, adding that Palmyra is an
international Syrian city which is recorded on World heritage list.
“We hoped the international community wouldn’t fail to defend Palmyra,
but we didn’t touch any actual reaction by it,” Abdul-Kareem said,
referring to the great sacrifices offered by the army to protect the
city from the terrorists.
He affirmed that hundreds of statues were rescued through a series of
procedures taken by Culture Ministry which moved them into safe areas,
expressing concern over the destiny of monuments and temples in
Palmyra from the danger of ISIS terrorists.
'Stop Chinese real-estate-invasion' flyer drop help needed
'STOP THE CHINESE REAL ESTATE INVASION' FLYER DROP.
Party for Freedom needs your help in distributing our rally notice and party flyers in the Lane Cove area this Sunday. We will start early and finish late to get the message out to as many residents as possible. Even if you can only spare a few hours, your help is much appreciated.
Our government has disowned us on all issues facing the Australian people. It is up to us to fight back against the dark forces of Labor and Liberal and their treasonous policies on foreign ownership and open borders immigration.
Meet-up: Front of Woolworths, Longueville Rd., Lane Cove
Time: 10.00 to 10.30am, Sunday 24th May 2015
Info: Nick Folkes ph: 0417-679972
Australia's massive infrastructure gridlock
The audit by Infrastructure Australia spotlights transport networks as needing serious attention to cope with a national population that will grow from 22.3 million in 2011 to 30.5 million in 2031.
Our infrastructure backlog is not growing independently, or in a vacuum! It's being outstretched by heavy population growth.
SMH:$53 billion congestion crunch looms warns Infrastructure Australia
The report put the cost of congestion on all urban roads in Australia at $13.74 billion in 2011. It's a looming Ponzi scheme of greed, a self-fulfilling cycle of growth, then more congestion, more retrofitting of our over-crammed cities, and then a backlog of infrastructure that grows and grows and demands more taxpayers to help pay for it! We've landed in the middle of a big and growing Juggernaut we have to keep paying, but never get out of.
We may as well claim that Australia is now a "regime", rather than a democratic government. This "growth" is not allowed to be questioned, and is outside public debate. However, the public will lose productivity and they will be force to foot the bill!
This cost is killing our economy, and the only way our governments can see out is more "growth" and more infrastructure. It is shifting the blame onto the population that never asked for hundreds of thousands of immigrants per year.
Infrastructure Australia chairman Mark Birrell said that "It is time for the nation to treat population growth as a fact, a fact our nation should accept and gear up for..."
It's not a FACT, but politically engineered, outside democratic processes!
"Without action road travel times in Perth, Melbourne, Sydney, Adelaide, Brisbane and Canberra are expected to increase by at least 20 per cent in the most congested corridors by 2031." What is the point of a "growing" economy when our quality of life is trampled in the process? It makes people no more than cogs in the wheel of the machinery they are trapped in.
It's a false economy that relies on population growth for the desired figures so politicians can put up charts to impress voters and retain power to make greater profits for their corporate sponsors.
As most of the growth is from economic immigration, and family reunions, then there must be a cost/benefit analysis of bulking up our population, considered against huge infrastructure spending.
Infrastructure was cheaper initially, but retro-fitting our cities is hideously expensive and 70 million people by the end of the century needs a re-think!
More reason to vote for Sustainable Population Party next elections.
Housing is not meant to be affordable
The frenzy of building houses, struggling to keep up with population growth, is not about providing a service, or creating "affordable housing". It's an industry, to make investors happy and produce good returns. Pumping up our population with skilled economic migrants ensures demand remains inflated, as we all need some sort of housing. It's an investor's market, a reflection of the fading mining boom, we now have a housing boom!
The fact that we are producing more and more homelessness is being ignored by governments. They are just the flotsam and jet-some of "economic growth" and lazy economics. Easier to blame dysfunctional human traits, such as drugs, alcohol, domestic violence and poverty, not the whole cause and effect of unaffordable housing. Liberal governments don't have ethics, or social conscience, so it's just about money and profits.
Then Britain’s leading economist, John Maynard Keynes, explained that capitalism could last indefinitely under the new conditions if certain traditional policies of the capitalist governments and central banks were changed.
Government policies based on Keynesian theories and the institution of central banking form a nexus of central economic planning. It's a winner-take-all proposition for businesses. Housing is one of the three pillars of the Australian economy, along with financial institutions and natural resources, but banks are warning that houses in Australia are the most inflated of anywhere in the world.
Various governments sold out to the international central banking cartel long ago, with a variety of short sighted “deals” such as the GST , compulsory superannuation, FIrst home buyers, High immigration, and "free” trade! The models themselves are based on Keynesianism currency, which we are told means that more circulating money = more GDP= A better economy. Central Bankers need to convert every productive asset and home into a ” bank asset” and drain wages and earnings from workers into their clutches. Melbourne and Sydney are set to double in population in the next few years. It's all about promoting and inflating the housing bubble, lending, and our GDP. The fact that infrastructure backlog is blowing out won't be a problem as the people will pay for it!
Who killed Kennedy and why? - a critical issue for 62 years
The following is to be posted to a forum discusion on JohnQuiggin.com
Tim on May 22nd, 2015 at 11:10,
My apologies for implying, whether implicitly or explicitly, that you were not posting to this forum in good faith.
Nonetheless, I think you should acknowledge that the issue of who killed President Kennedy, and why, is one of the critical questions of the late 20th century and the early 21st century. The 1,000 days for which Kennedy was President was one of two occasions in which the United States made a constructive, and not destructive, contribution to humanity. The other occasion was the period from March 1933 until April 1945.
In that time President Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR):
- scrapped the dogma of economic neoliberalism and used massive government spending programs to eliminate unemployment and lift the standard of living from ordinary Americans; and
- against understandable public opposition, got America to enter the Second World War against Nazi Germany and its allies, thereby probably making the difference (not withstanding the bravery of, and terrible sacrifice by, the Soviet peoples) between the survival of democracy and the global triumph of Nazism.
We are living today, in May 2015, with the consequences of the murders of the two Kennedy brothers and of Martin Luther King and the rule of the United States by a succession mostly of rogues since 1963. The consequences include:
- The Vietnam War;
- The wars and sanctions against Iraq since 1990 which according to former United States' Attorney General Ramsey Clarke, have cost as many as 3 million lives including 750,00 children;
- The invasion of Libya in 2011;
- The terrorist proxy war against Syria since march 2011, which has since 2011, cost over 220,000 lives;
- The coup which installed a neo-Nazi regime in Ukraine in January 2014 and the subsequent war against Russian speaking people in East Ukraine; and
- The current invasion of Yemen by the Saudi Arabian dictatorship.
Tim on May 22nd, 2015 at 11:10:
The stuff about law enforcement officers is just a rant, that has no relevance to anything I said.
The relevance is: With the exception of Jim Garrison and a few others, including a number of other police officers and security agents on duty in Dallas on 22 November 1963, most law enforcement officers with the responsibility to care for President Kennedy and solve his murder, abysmally failed in their duty to test "multiple points of view that are at odds with each other" against the evidence. That is why an innocent man was framed for the murder and killed that very same day before the supposed evidence against him could be tested in a court of law.
A good resource to understand the history of the United States is The Untold History of the United States (2012) by Oliver Stone and Peter Kuznick. The video of that book is now freely available here (update, 3/6/16 - no longer available, supposedly because of copyright violations) on YouTube.
More has come to light on ISIS origins and US involvement
Some more info had come up up in addition to my article, the really great blog Moon of Alabama recently built off my article and found that the DIA documents released in 2012 not only knew the Syrian opposition was dominated by al-Qaeda, they actually predicted that US support would lead to an "Islamic principality" (ie the Islamic State) in eastern Syria, but not just that, but that the Western supporters of the opposition actually WANTED this to happen... Further they also predicted the fall of Ramadi! So we don't have to wonder why the US only did 7 air strikes while IS took it over, nor do we have to wonder why the US didn't bomb IS while they were in the open celebrating their Ramadi victory: the fall of Ramadi was all part of the plan. Check it out for yourself: http://www.moonofalabama.org/2015/05/us-intelligence-predicted-us-support-for-rebels-in-syria-would-lead-to-fall-of-ramadi.html
Steven Chovanec
Cause and effect: neoliberal 'reforms' and growing hunger
The following is adapted from a post to a forum discussion, about the imposition of globalising 'race to the bottom' neoliberal economic 'reforms' by then Federal 'Labor' Paul Keating and his successors since 1983, and its effects, on JohnQuiggin.com :
A story in a local community newspaper, Australians feeling the hunger strain further confirms the overwhelming anecdotal evidence on this page (see May 19th, 2015 at 20:06):
TEN per cent of Australians say they can't afford to buy enough food.
That damning figure from the 2014 report by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development is compounded by the waste of so much fresh food.
...
Foodbank Victoria's Hunger Report last year revealed almost 9000 Victorians – 2700 of them children – were being turned away from food charities that couldn't keep up with demand.
The report, compiled from responses by 1197 food relief agencies, showed that more than 90,900 people in Victoria alone accessed food relief each month – almost a third of them children.
...
Opposed to investigation of crime?
The comment subject was previously "Warren Commission apologist opposed to investigation of crime?", but I have changed it after the person concerned objected.
The following was posted to a forum discussion on JohnQuiggin.com :
Thank you, Megan on May 21st, 2015 at 01:06 and on May 20th, 2015 at 21:32 and Julie on May 21st, 2015 at 09:06.
On the one hand Tim, by dismissing the evidence presented in Oliver Stone's JFK and in Jim Garrison's On the Trail of the Assassins, is taking sides with those, here and elsewhere, who wish to cover up the facts about the murder of President Kennedy on 22 November 1963 (and the murder of others who have blown the whistle on JFK's murder since) and, on the other hand, Tim has twice stated (on May 20th, 2015 at 17:08 and on May 21st, 2015 at 10:43) that he has no interest in finding out the truth of this matter.
You can't have it both ways, Tim. Either deal with the arguments I have presented or stop wasting my time and and stop wasting the time of other visitors.
Tim wrote on May 21st, 2015 at 10:43 :
Also, the JFK film, based on Garrison's account, provides just one point of view on an issue that, rather obviously, has multiple points of view that are at odds with each other.
The murder of a President John F. Kennedy on 22 November 1963 was a crime. When a crime is committed, particularly a crime as serious as the murder of a country's head of state (not to mention the subsequent escalation of the Vietnam War, made possible by that murder) the job of the police is to solve that crime, to charge and arrest suspects and present the evidence they have gathered to court so that a jury can decide on whether the person or persons charged is guilty or not guilty.
If all law enforcement officers were to adopt the mindset displayed by Tim, a good many more serious crimes would remain unsolved.
Victory for dolphins
See also: Japan aquariums vote to stop using dolphins from Taiji (20/5/15) | Japan Times News, Japanese association to ban aquariums from obtaining dolphins captured via drive fishery (21/5/15) | Asia One, Japan aquariums say they'll stop getting Taiji-hunt dolphins (21/5/15) | Boston Herald, Japan Aquariums to Stop Obtaining Dolphins from Taiji (21/5/15), Australian group forces Japanese aquariums to stop buying dolphins caught in harrowing chase (21/5/15) | SMH
There's few victories for animals, and for animal rights activists, in a world more and more captured by human concerns, but at least there is one victory - for captured dolphins!
In a stunning setback to the dolphin hunt in Taiji, the Japanese Association of Zoos and Aquariums on Wednesday banned its members from acquiring animals captured during the annual slaughter. Of the country’s 54 aquariums that house dolphins, 17 are non-JAZA members and are not bound by the decision.
It's a blow to the live animal trade in Taiji!
The Pacific coast town of Taiji is known for its fishermen who trap dolphins and then kill them to sell their meat, a practice widely condemned as brutal. Fishermen also capture a small number for sale at zoos and aquariums. The meat is said to be laced with mercury!
JAZA (Japanese Association of Zoos and Aquariums) will "prohibit its members to acquire wild dolphins caught by drive fishing in Taiji and to take part in their export and sale,” the group’s chairman, Kazutoshi Arai, said at a news conference on Wednesday.
“This momentous decision marks the beginning of the end for dolphin hunting in Japan,” Australia for Dolphins chief executive Sarah Lucas said. It should mean the beginning of the end of cruel and brutal and unwarranted dolphin killings, and the end of taking these social animals out of the group into the artificial world of captivity, and entertainment.
Has Saudi Arabia reason to be "furious with the United States"?
Sheila Newman wrote in the above article:
Saudi Arabia ... appears to have gone on a rampage because it is furious with the United States for talking to Iran, whom it considers a religious enemy.
Given the record of the United States since 1990 – genocidal sanctions against Iraq after 1990, the Gulf War of 1990-1991, the invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, the invasion of Iraq in 2003, complicity in the overthrow of Muammar Gaddafi in Libya in 2100, the proxy terrorist war against Syria which has claimed over 220,000 lives since March 2011, installation of the neo-Nazi regime in Ukraine in February 2014 – I think it highly unlikely that the United States would ever act out of good intent.
Siding with the Islamic Republic of Iran against the despotic, pro-imperialist Kingdom of Saudi Arabia would appear on the surface to be an act of good intent on the part of the United States. However, given the the number of times in history where appearance has differed markedly from what actually occurred, 1 I would need more evidence before I am convinced that, on this occasion, the United States has truly sided with Iran against Saudi Arabia.
Footnote[s]
1. ↑ One striking example is include the sinking of the USS Liberty by Israeli warplanes on 8 June 1967, the fourth day of the Six Day War. The clear intention of Israel was to ensure that there were no survivors and blame Egypt for the sinking of the Liberty, thereby providing President Johnson a pretext to join the war against Egypt. Had a nearby Soviet warship witnessed the incident, their would have been no survivors.
Regarding the presence of witnesses aboard a Soviet warship referred in the paragraph above, I believe I read this on a previous occasion. However, I am not able to find, in any of a number of otherwise informative articles about the USS Liberty incident, any mention of this or any explanation of why the attack was stopped – a suprising omission.
Further note: In fact, the Voltaire Net article, republished on candobetter.net as mentioned above, states:
They only stopped at the approach of a Soviet ship, after killing 34 crew members, mostly engineers, technicians and translators.
My recollection was correct after all.
Extremist Cranks Press Release!
Citizens Electoral Council of Australia
Media Release Wednesday, 20 May 2015
Craig Isherwood‚ National Secretary
PO Box 376‚ COBURG‚ VIC 3058
Phone: 1800 636 432
Email: [email protected]
Website: http://www.cecaust.com.au
Australia should rescue and settle Rohingya refugees
The world’s richest, emptiest nation should open its arms to the refugees from Myanmar who have been forced to drift for months off Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand.
Adults and children alike suffered incredible hardship, running short of food and water, with no relief from the elements and the incessant swells of the ocean, as nations refused to let them land until the last few days.
Australia should take the lead on rescuing these desperate people, by sending the navy to transport them here for settlement. We should take this action, not just because our nation boasts a rich continent which can easily fit many more people, but because we are, in a real sense, responsible for the appalling way they have been treated.
In pushing back these refugees, and extending their suffering on the ocean, Malaysia, Thailand and Indonesia—which unlike Australia cannot be called underpopulated—are emulating the shameful behaviour Australia has taken towards refugees since the MV Tampa incident in 2001.
Certain European nations—notably the UK—have also started to emulate Australia’s behaviour, with regard to the African refugees crossing the Mediterranean from Libya, and with deadly results.
Australia began this race to the moral bottom; Australia must take the lead in reversing it.
The great lie: we’re saving lives
The great, Goebbels-style lie (yes, Goebbels—a Nazi policy deserves a Nazi name) that has been drummed into Australians to justify our appalling treatment of boat people is that it is necessary to save their lives, to stop them from drowning at sea.
On 17 May Prime Minister Tony Abbott piously gave his blessing to the actions of Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand: “I don’t apologise in any way for the action that Australia has taken to preserve safety at sea by turning boats around where necessary,” he said. “And if other countries choose to do that, frankly that is almost certainly absolutely necessary if the scourge of people smuggling is to be beaten.”
The proof that this is a great lie is that Australia’s cruel policy started before refugees drowned at sea. It actually started when Keating’s Labor initiated mandatory detention, but it took on its brutal present form in 2001 when Abbott’s mentor John Howard was facing electoral defeat, and decided to make an example of the 438 Hazara Afghani refugees fleeing the Taliban and Al-Qaeda who had been rescued by the Norwegian vessel MV Tampa, by refusing to let them land in Australia. “We will decide who comes to this country, and the circumstances in which they come,” Howard bellowed in his 28 October 2001 election campaign launch speech—an attitude and tone that wouldn’t have been out of place in one of the Nazi fist-pumping rallies staged in Sydney in the 1930s by the pro-fascist New Guard, which his father Lyall probably attended as a member. Howard’s re-election ensured that this cynical scapegoating of refugees would become the new standard in Australian politics.
The first deaths at sea occurred two months after Howard stopped the MV Tampa from offloading its passengers, when the SIEV-X sank with more than 400 passengers—an incident that to this day is shrouded in mystery, as it coincided with Howard’s policy to turn boats around, which some suspect to have caused the sinking. In a different incident, Howard’s minister Peter Reith was caught out lying that refugees deliberately threw their children overboard—an intentional slander calculated to deflect scrutiny of the government’s policy, and make out the refugees to be responsible for inflicting their own suffering.
Not all Australians would be aware that our nation’s name is forever enshrined in infamy, at the Yad Vashem holocaust memorial in Jerusalem, where the words of the Menzies government’s delegate to the 1938 Evian conference on Jewish refugees are on display, to epitomise the attitude that led to millions of Jews being abandoned to Nazi genocide. US President Franklin Roosevelt had convened the conference in Evian, France, to try to organise a coordinated effort by nations to take those desperate to flee Hitler. Australia’s delegate, Trade Minister T.W. White, set the tone that ultimately led to the failure of the conference when he expressed the Menzies government’s unwillingness to accept more Jewish refugees; White stated that it “will no doubt be appreciated that as we have no racial problem, we are not desirous of importing one.” These are the words on display at the holocaust memorial.
Malcolm Fraser redeemed our nation for its shame when he demonstrated how a civilised society should treat people in desperate need of sanctuary. John Howard, Rudd/Gillard, and now Abbott have again earned Australia its place in the holocaust memorial.
It’s easy to prove that welcoming refugees to Australia will be a benefit to our nation, not a cost. It’s easy to prove that Australia is an empty continent in desperate need of economic development, in which new Australians would be enthusiastic participants, as they were on the Snowy Mountains Scheme, Tasmania’s hydro development, and other such projects. It’s easy to prove that the costs we are presently incurring to treat people so cruelly, in the form of billions of taxpayers’ dollars going to shady private prison contractors such as the British firm SERCO, are far greater than if we let them all live in Australia.
But those are the secondary reasons that Australia should take the lead on helping these refugees. The primary reason is that it is the right thing to do.
For an Australia that is committed to the common good of all people, and the necessary policies of economic development that can meet the needs of all people, join the CEC.
ISIS gains correlate with increased US aid to extremists
ISIS gains in Palmyra I think are correlated to the US-coalition ramping up aid to the extremists:
In Israeli intelligence source DebkaFile's weekly newsletter (which you have to pay to get) they note that
"Bashar Assad’s fortunes have been waning in recent weeks. His army’s morale is in the pits. Some units are keeping to the sidelines of battles. Iran no longer rushes forward with fresh military supplies. Hizballah, the strongest force still fighting for Assad, is taking heavy losses at the hands of Al Qaeda’s Syrian arm, the Nusra Front. All this is the outcome of the first heavy weapons to reach the hands of the Syrian opposition in years of civil war from Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the United Arab Emirates and Turkey – blessed by Washington after long hesitation."
This, coupled with a recent NYT revelation that King Salman
"has shifted toward an activist foreign policy, going to war in Yemen and increasing support for rebels in Syria as he positions his country as the defender of the region’s Sunnis. In some cases, he has sanctioned allying with Islamists to serve the kingdom’s agenda... And his support for Islamists could end up empowering extremists, just as Saudi support for the Afghan jihad decades ago helped create Al Qaeda... In another shift, King Salman appears to have discarded his predecessor’s rejection of political Islamists like the Muslim Brotherhood as a fundamental threat to the regional order... King Salman has a history of working with Islamists. Decades ago, he was a royal point man and fund-raiser for jihadists going to Afghanistan, Bosnia and elsewhere."King Salman Upends Status Quo in Region and the Royal Family (10/5/15) by Ben Hubbard | New York Times
So in essence, what the NYT is saying without saying, coupled with the Debka report, is that Saudi Arabia, with the blessing of the US, is ramping up aid to ISIS in Syria, and Obama has approved of providing heavier weaponry to the opposition after long hesitation.
And now we see ISIS gaining ground in regions like Palmyra. Coincidence? I think not...
Syrian Armed Forces Withdraw: ISIS controls Palmyra
Official: Syrian Armed Forces Withdraw from Ancient City of Palmyra
By Leith Fadel on May 20, 2015 Featured
The Syrian Armed Forces (Syrian Arab Army’s 18th Tank Battalion and National Defense Forces) have officially withdrawn all of their soldiers from the ancient city of Palmyra (Tadmur) after a large-scale assault was launched by the Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham (ISIS) for the second time in six days.
According to a military source, 16 National Defense Forces (NDF) and Syrian Arab Army (SAA) soldiers were killed-in-action (KIA) and another 68 were wounded during the fierce clashes for the Palmyra National Hospital, Palmyra Museum, Palmyra Military Airbase, Desert and Development Office, Badiyah Military Branch Office, and the northern suburbs of this ancient city in the east Homs Governorate of Syria.
The military source unable to confirm the exact number of deaths ISIS sustained during the violent battle for Palmyra; however, he was able to confirm that a force of about 600-800 militants reinforced their entrenched comrades and helped them recapture their lost points to the Syrian Armed Forces.
The Syrian Armed Forces are still on the outskirts of Palmyra, but they hold no positions inside the city itself; if they were to counter-attack, they would launch the assault from Mount Qassoun, where they currently possess the higher ground against ISIS armed combatants.
EU quota system collapsing
EU quotas for migrants crossing the Mediterranean sea come into rough waters. Quota proposals were drawn up in response to the refugee crisis that has seen hundreds of people drown off the coast of Italy as the attempt to flee Libya. A quota system to be imposed on member states stipulates how many refugees each country should accept is rapidly losing support with France now joining the “No” camp.
The UK last week said it would opt out of the scheme but now Spain, Estonia, the Czech Republic and Poland among several others are opposed to the idea.
Italy’s Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, whose country is bearing the brunt of the migrant surge. The numbers are far too numerous to accommodate.
A UK Tory MP Nigel Mills said: “This is a very aggressive approach for the European Commission to take when they know the concerns that people have in this country. They are better off trying to find a solution to this problem of people fleeing from North Africa rather than making threats that are totally unacceptable to the British people.”
Local problems need to be addressed locally, not adding it to a global problem. The best way to stop the drownings at sea is to stop the boats.
Germany is accepting 200,000 asylum seekers, but Home Office spokesman said the proposal was “unacceptable” to the UK.
Britain accepted 31,745 refugee cases last year but could see the number more than double to the level seen in other EU countries. There's conflict in Libya, due to civil war. However, the nation has also become a transit point for sub-Saharan Africans who previously sought work in Libya and for Syrian refugees attempting to get to Europe by way of North Africa.
Open borders are not feasible, and Europe cannot help but say no to most refugees because the continent simply does not have the means to keep all migrants and refugees in the long term.
live export cattle being killed with sledgehammer in Vietnam
Shocking footage has emerged of live export Australian cattle being bludgeoned to death with sledgehammers in Vietnam. There is a call for a BAN on live export. Evidence reveals slaughterers in abattoirs, that appear to be more like sheds, repeatedly hitting cattle over the head with sledgehammers!
The hidden camera vision was captured late last month in a facility in northern Vietnam.
Animals Australia spokeswoman Lisa Chalk said Vietnam was currently the second-largest export market for Australian cattle, with 178,000 animals exported there in 2014. There's nothing more alluring than MONEY and PROFITS to negate any responsibility for ethics or morals when it comes to animal welfare.
Agriculture Minister Barnaby Joyce said there were already three reviews under way into breaches in Vietnam of a system known as the Exporter Supply Chain Assurance Scheme. The ESCAS is nothing than an empty policy, and once animals are overseas, all control is gone.
But Mr Joyce said the government was “totally committed” to the industry. Similarly, terrorists and criminals are also "totally committed" to their causes!
The probe is seeking to determine how three family-run abattoirs got access to the animals, given they were not accredited.
In his usual unmovable and draconian mode, Mr Joyce ruled out any ban on live cattle exports, saying Australia had to fix the issue rather than resort to knee-jerk reactions. So, any exposure and outcry from the caring public is simply over-emotional response, a "knee jerk" reaction? There are social psychopaths that have no empathy for other living things, and can't understand the democratic system, or any other response to industries except profits and filthy lucre!
VicForests illegal logging exposed
The Department of Environment found VicForests had needlessly destroyed rainforest canopy on the Errinundra Plateau. However, in revenge, members of an environment group, Goongerah Environment Centre (GECO), who revealed evidence of rainforest clearing in East Gippsland, in south-east Victoria, have been threatened with prosecution!
Whistle-blowers are not welcome in the logging industry, and if they do expose corruption, they end up being prosecuted!
The state forestry compliance officer has now threatened to prosecute members of GECO for trespassing in the disputed logging coupes. But, if they hadn't entered the "disputed" area the illegal vandalism would not have been discovered! Clearly, government organisations don't like the public exposing environmental crimes.
East Gippsland's Valley of the Giants contains some of the finest remaining old growth forest left in Victoria.
Mr Ed Hill said he had asked for Environment Minister Lisa Neville to intervene. They found that VicForests had needlessly destroyed rainforest canopy on the Errinundra Plateau. This violation of old growth forests in Gipplsand is for claimed to be for windows, doors and timber for the housing industry, to prop up the housing bubble and keep the building frenzy alive, while we continue with our world-record breaking rate of population growth. Actually, records obtained from VicForests' show that 85 per cent of our native forests end up as woodchips, sawdust and waste. This is a taxpayer-subsidised industry!
Green group threatened with prosecution after revealing Errinundra Plateau rainforest clearing
The Great Forest National Park is needed in Victoria.
Sign the petition:
Petition for the Great Forest National Park
Oppose New World Order glovepuppets Clinton,... Support Sanders!
Sheila Newman wrote:
... is there anyone else in America likely to win who is not a raging narcissist and paranoid warmonger? Is it indeed possible to be a multimillionaire and not psychopathic? ...
We must not forget that for all the grave flaws of America's democracy, including its presidential election system, at least three great people, of good intention and opposed to the interests of the corporate elites, were elected to the office of President since the middle of the 19th century – Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Delano Roosevelt (FDR) and John F Kennedy (JFK). In 1968, JFK's younger brother Robert Kennedy (RFK or Bobby Kennedy) was suspiciously murdered just as he was about to win the Democratic Presidential primaries in 1968. Had both RFK and Jim Garrison, who was working to prosecute one of those who had conspired to murder JFK (as portrayed in Oliver Stone's JFK of 1991), thought to work together that murder could well have been prevented. Bobby Kennedy would then almost certainly have won the elections of 1968, and in doing so, have brought the bloody Vietnam war to an end five and as half years before it was eventually to end in May 1975.
These examples show that, for all the shortcomings of the American Presidential system and for all the perils faced by candidates not in the pockets of the corporate elites, it is still possible for a good candidate to win.
The only course of action that could possibly cause any good to come out of the American Presidential elections, not just for Americans, but for the rest of humanity, which also has a stake in the outcome, is to support any candidate who stands for principled domestic international policies. One such candidate is Bernie Sanders.
Given the advantages the Internet gives anybody with evidence and logic to back up his/her viewpoint, and the existence on that Internet of large independent anti-corporate, anti-war newsmedia, both inside America and overseas, it should not be precluded that a good candidate such as Bernie Sanders may well be elected president, whether as an endorsed Democrat or Republican, an Independent or a Green.
Even if Bernie Sanders were not to win, a large grassroots campaign in support of Sanders could well make it much harder for the winner to implement his/her plans to serve his/her corporate masters and extend the United States' global hegemony.
Hilary Clinton article
Hillary Clinton article
Well, I watched the second movie in this article on Hilary, "Hillary Clinton Exposed, Movie She Banned From Theaters Full Movie."
It was obviously made by conservatives and neocons. They fear that Hilary would try to bring in national health care and national education, which they believe is socialism and for them that is beyond the pale. She is termed in the movie as 'the closest thing in America to a European socialist' - seen to be a bad thing. They also cast doubt on her ability to commit to defend America - by which they mean to further US aggression and domination globally. Then they describe a number of scandals - some very unsavory and involving court cases - that the Clintons were involved in. They accuse Hillary of being a psychopath and she may very well be one; the examples given were fairly convincing - but it isn't like the film-makers didn't have their own political agenda.
Despite the professed concerns that Hilary would not commit to war strongly enough, I am personally very worried by Clinton because of what seemed a very stupid, insensitive and gung-ho approach to war in her book, Hard Choices; a willingness to purvey war propaganda. I did come away with the impression that Hillary Clinton is a psychopath. If she were to maintain the position she puts in her book, then I would say that she would make WW3 all that much closer.
That said, is there anyone else in America likely to win who is not a raging narcissist and paranoid warmongerer? Is it indeed possible to be a multimillionaire and not psychopathic? But that doesn't make Hillary okay.
[Note: I have edited this comment a bit the next day by including the title and link to a review of Clinton's book.]
Channel 9's criminal propaganda in MH17 'theory'
Having read more thoroughly this interview that you have republished with the Ukrainian soldier, I have to say that this is really a great discovery, and a shocking one. To me, it suggests collusion between Channel 9 and the Ukrainian SBU/Kiev junta, with the intent to continue and reinforce the deceit of Australians, and to continue the ‘war on Russia’ and demonisation of Putin.
It simply is not tolerable that Channel 9 gets away with putting out this truly criminal propaganda serving the 'interests' of Australia and the US and NATO. It is in fact not serving Australia's interests or those of the poor relatives of the victims of Ukraine's criminal junta - if only they knew! The testimony of this soldier brilliantly destroys all of Eliot Higgins 'open source' 'investigations', for which I assume he was paid handsomely by GCHQ and other agencies. It also makes apparent that Channel 9 cooperated with Kiev and the SBU, having copied the SBU's false claims about BUK missiles - that we had that interview with the disgusting Arseny Yatsenyuk - who proves himself a psychopathic liar yet again - shows what sort of 'coordination' there was with Kiev. It doesn't seem much of a jump to imagine that Channel 9 was actually contracted/invited/seduced into coming to Ukraine to make this stunt film, as the case for the 'Russian controlled separatists' having shot down MH17 evaporates like the mysterious BUK con-trail....
Urgent: Mary Drost's Australia-wide population referendum
The Thomson vs Doyle population debate at Deakin Edge on 13 October 2014 culminated in a call by Mary Drost, of Planning Backlash, for a referendum on Australia's population growth. Both Kelvin Thomson and Lord Mayor Doyle agreed that this was a good idea.
Now Mary has put a petition for this up at Change.org Please consider signing it. We need that referendum.
Petitioning Member for Wills Federal government – attention Kelvin Thomson, Federal Member for Wills
An Australia-wide referendum to be as follows: 'Do you agree that Australia should keep on growing at the present rate because of the much higher immigration numbers that the government has introduced? Yes or No.'
We the people of Australia have never been asked what we think about the huge increase of population that our government is determined to give us, therefore we request that the government conduct an Australia-wide referendum and let the people decide if we want a big Australia or not.
Member for Wills Federal government – attention Kelvin Thomson, Federal Member for Wills
To promote this page here are two links: http://tinyurl.com/k8hnzbd
and
60 Minutes slick MH17 propaganda irresponsible impacts
Please watch and consider - this slick propaganda is now believed by all Australians who watch 60 mi
Minutes - screened at 8.30 on Sunday night and one of the most viewed programmes. And for the otherwise uninformed the 'evidence' - which they call 'proof' - is quite convincing. It draws your attention away from the key faults in any such 'analysis', particularly the question of WHY on earth would Vladimir Putin order a Russian BUK launcher to go into Donetsk specifically to shoot down a passenger plane over rebel territory? Anyone faced with that question would surely agree, whatever they think of VVP - that it would be insane - much like Assad throwing Sarin at his own people in front of UN inspectors.
So it never mentions motivation. Meanwhile it cleverly dodges round key issues - the lack of photos or reports of the BUK missile launch, and the nature of the damage to MH17. In the first case, there is a photo showing remains of a con-trail, perhaps of a smaller SAM, which someone tweeted, and Eliot H uses to 'geolocate' the origin of this on the ground - a ploughed field where they state absolutely categorically 'this is where the missile was fired from'.
As for the damage - an 'expert' shows pieces of metal with simulated shrapnel and bullet damage ( though there is no mention of the SU25 having shot the plane down with BULLETS, and we see it loosing a missile in the 15 second 'Russia says' section), but then we actually see a photo - the famous photo of the bullet riddled cockpit section - immediately after a photo of bullet perforated metal, but the way the camera pans across it allows the presenter to say that 'it clearly shows this is shrapnel damage' even as we see the round holes!!
Most notably missing is the crucial point that a BUK missile launcher cannot operate without its accompanying radar and guidance system, which is on a similar sized vehicle. CANNOT OPERATE.
Also missing of course is the report from the Russian defence team, showing the radar photos of aircraft trails, and observations about the US satellite over the area. What we have instead is a debunking of that fabricated photo which was shown on one Russian TV station of a sat photo of the missile being launched from a fighter jet. This one suspected always was a straw man, put up there by the other side. It is here presented as 'the Russian evidence'.
The last part focuses on a photo long debunked, which they say the Russians used to claim the BUK came from Ukie territory, but then show it was actually taken in Lugansk and shows the launcher returning to Russia with a missile missing. This was actually the photo the Ukies first put out and claimed it showed the launcher, which was then debunked by Russia because it had been taken in Ukie territory! Very clever Mr Higgins!
But the consequence at the end is truly disturbing - saying that the killer missile was operated by young Russian soldiers who weren't really responsible as it was Vlad Putin - and we get a demonic head shot of him to end the program.
How hard do we now have to work to tell the hopeless Australian public the truth? And just at a time when there is some light on the horizon over Donetsk and the Russian sanctions.
Admission that university standards are falling
This drive to attract more foreign students, by offering them job opportunities after, is more an admission of our failure to keep our universities attractive and viable. So, they are offered an extra incentive to come here and study! Australia is the most expensive place for an international student to go to university but it is not seen as the best place for a top quality education. It was estimated an international student in Australia would spend more than $42,000 each year on fees and supporting themselves. We ranked relatively low on quality and we are the most expensive, given that education is our largest export service.
Around 70 students from the universities of Newcastle and Sydney, and several other major universities, were recently caught up in a cheating racket stemming from their use of an online essay writing company. The website was written in Chinese, aimed at international students.
"The gap between student capabilities and academic demands increases the likelihood that students will offer inducements to academics in order to pass courses and, conversely, makes students more vulnerable to improper demands from academics," an Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC)paper said. The ICAC report found that academics can feel pressure to not enforce compliance with academic standards because of the competitive environment of the international student market. So, unless academics compromise their standards, they are threatened with job losses, and universities might lose more of their revenues! The educational export industry relies on international students for their fees, and rights to jobs are added in to the basket to attract more participants despite record high unemployment and that local graduates struggle to get jobs.
Consequences of neo-liberal economic 'reforms' since 1983
The following was posted to a forum discussion on JohnQuiggin.com :
Ikonoclast at May 18th, 2015 at 09:37 asked:
I really wonder what is happening in our society. I know is isn't good. Our young people are filled with despair and alienation.
This is an example of cause and effect.
The cause is the globalising neo-liberal 'small government' economic 'reforms' that Keating and his heirs on both 'sides' of our Federal and state parliaments have imposed on Australia since 1983.
The effect is that our society which is becoming ever more dysfunctional with higher unemployment, less career structure and more crime, domestic violence, drug abuse, health problems, environmental destruction, etc.
A component of this is the ever higher immigration of skilled workers in place of workers trained in Australia being employed here. (This was known as the Section 457 Visa system, but I believe it now goes by another name.)
As I may have written before, I remember a time when many workers would be trained in work time at the expense of their employers, whether government or private, and there was no need to study part-time, including late in the evenings or on weekends to get the additional necessary qualifications. (Another aspect of this scam is creeping credentialism, but, for now, I will leave that for another time.)
One Federal Member of Parliament who has consistently spoken up against much of this is the Labor Member for Wills, Kelvin Thomson.
Relaxation of the 485 graduate visa
CLOSE to half of international students want to live and work in Adelaide after they graduate, a landmark survey has found, prompting migration and business experts to say they must be harnessed as an economic resource to fill skills shortages and boost the state’s population.
Close to half of South Australia's international students want to live and work in Adelaide after they graduate (This 'premium content' Herald-Sun article is behind a paywall. - Ed)
With record rates of unemployment, how does SA have "skills shortages" unless it's due to non-investment in domestic skill training and unaffordable university courses? SA’s monthly unemployment rate was 7.3 per cent in January, up from 6.6 per cent in December – and the worst in the nation.
Youth unemployment was up to 23.6 per cent, above the national rate of 20.3 per cent.
Thousands more foreign students will get the green light to compete for Australian jobs as from March this year, when the Government expands a work visa scheme. The Immigration quietly, by stealth, make these "changes" to visas outside democratic consultation, and without any relationship to needs or our employment landscape! It's using access to a tight jobs market as a lure for international students, to boost numbers!
We should be promoting academic excellence, and high standards of training and degrees, but all reports are on the contrary! Tertiary educational standards are being compromised by its business nature, so these "students" must now be given more opportunities to WORK in Australia too - and then PR?
From March 23, all international students will be allowed to stay and work in any job for up to four years after they graduate from an Australian university.
Work rules relaxed for foreign students
Our government is guilty of breath-taking hypocrisy by going through the motions of tightening restrictions on the 457 visa rort, to "crack down" on the system of putting imported workers before Australians in job queues, but at the same time expanding and relaxing the student visa system!
In response, Immigration Minister Brendan O'Conner's spokesperson said- "There is no guarantee that sub-class 485 visa holders will find a job at the expense of an Australian student". How out of touch with reality are these pollies - in their lofty towers away from the real world!
She said the government would monitor the use of the visas and "make changes in response to economic and employment circumstances". Australians should be first in the educational, training priorities, and job queues, not be apologies for international students who are being promoted at our expense!
Advertised for 8:33PM +10 60 Minutes tracks the MH17 murderers
My Free-to-air TV guide advises that this will be on 60 Minutes on Channel 9 at 8:33PM (GMT+10hours) tonight, Sunday 17 March 2015:
Exclusive: Deep inside Ukraine, we track the murderers who shot down flight MH17, killing 38 Australians.
It seems that his will be the first of 3 stories covered in the one hour program. Let's hope that 60 Minutes gives some justice to the 38 Australians, amongst the 298 victims of the Poroshenko regime's botched act of false flag terrorism.
Overpopulation of Myanmar's muslims the cause of tensions
Somewhere between 6,000 and 20,000 Rohingya refugees from Myanmar are drifting in the Andaman Sea while neighbouring countries take turns to deny them entry.
Along Myanmar’s crescent-shaped western coast, Buddhist communities fear their dominance is under siege. As in parts of Europe — such as The Netherlands and France — Myanmar’s riled-up patriots warn of a population time bomb: A demographic explosion of Muslims 'breeding' them into oblivion.
Authorities in western Myanmar’s Rakhine state have introduced a local regulation setting a two-child limit on Rohingya families in a bid to restrict population growth among the Muslim minority group.
The 2012 two-child limit only applies to Rohingyas, a stateless group widely considered in Myanmar to be illegal immigrants from Bangladesh even though they have lived in the country for generations. The measures were being implemented to curb Rohingyas’ high population growth. Muslims in a province of Burma have been ordered not to have more than two children in an attempt by the government to stop Buddhist attacks on Muslims.
The population growth of Rohingya Muslims is 10 times higher than that of the Rakhine Buddhists), and overpopulation is one of the causes of tension.
The bill, which introduces the practice of “birth spacing” or a three-year interval for women between child births, is expected to be signed by President Thein Sein in the near future.
Reflecting this concern with population growth, Rakhine State spokesperson Win Myaing told media last year that “overpopulation is one of the causes of tension.” He added, “The population growth of Rohingya Muslims is 10 times higher than that of the Rakhine [Buddhists].’’
Myanmar- the worsening plight of the Rohinga
UNHCR has to expect more peoples fleeing from impoverished Bangladesh. Southern part of Bangladesh was sinking into sea because the country was built on very low lying area. It has effect 20 millions peoples’ lives who living on Southern part of Bangladesh. They have to move from their land in next decade.
Overpopulation causes conflicts, poverty, displacement, tension, stresses on finite natural resources, intolerance, and thus migration!
The reality is that our world is "shrinking" from the explosion of human numbers, and there are fewer nations in the world that have excess resources to share, and compassion will inevitably become thinned out!
Re: Horses not being treated as sentient animals
I completely agree with you.
All they are being seen as is dollar signs.
Something has to be done.
Woodchipping to go ballistic? Contact these pollies!
Message from Environment East Gippsland (http://www.eastgippsland.net.au/This is the latest:
The logging industry lobbyists have been telling everyone including politicians (they can be so naïve!) that tossing native forests into electricity furnaces is really ‘renewable energy’ because it would only be using the ‘waste’ – y’know – branches, leaves and those messy leftovers.
These claims were made 40 years ago to justify massive woodchipping of about 6 million tonnes a year, for decades. Untold deaths and horrific injuries of wildlife all being part of this.
Labor leader Bill Shorten will not be drawn on whether he will or won’t agree to this. Logging lobby group AFPA congratulated him. His environment minister, Mark Butler is saying ‘no way José. Is this playing good-cop bad-cop?
Join us to kill off this insane idea
What is needed is for Labor and the Independents to propose an amendment that defines ‘waste’, in such a way that it includes plantation and agricultural waste, even building waste, but clearly excludes native forest derived wood.
Unless this definition is unambiguously embedded in the RET legislation, it could raise its ugly head again as a regulation later down the track – and that could be worse.
Please – a couple of minutes of your day could make a lot of difference…
In order of importance, please call on Monday (it's more influential than emailing), the office of these politicians and leave a message for them.
And email or tweet them now…
Bill Shorten
(02) 6277 4022 or (03) 9326 1300
[email protected] @billshortenmp
Emphasise the need for an amendment to define 'waste' that excludes native forests from RETs
Mark Butler
(02) 6277 4089
[email protected] @mark_butler_mp
Emphasise the need for an amendment to define 'waste' that excludes native forests from RETs
Ricky Muir
(03) 5144 3639
[email protected] @Ricky_Muir
Emphasise that it won’t be just off-cuts but will be whole logs ! It will also rob limited assistance for genuine renewables like solar.
Zhenya Wang
(02) 6277 3843,
[email protected] @SenatorZWang
Ask that he supports an amendment to the RET Bill that defines extcludes native forest material from the ‘waste’ category and that there are more jobs in genuine renewables.
Nick Xenophon
(08) 8232 1144
[email protected] @Nick_Xenophon
Emphasise that including biomass in the RET will rob valuable assistance/credits from the solar industry.
Glenn Lazarus
(07) 3001 8940
[email protected] @SenatorLazarus
Emphasise that including biomass in the RET will rob valuable assistance/credits from the solar industry.
Clive Palmer
(07) 547 92800 or (02) 627 74372
[email protected] @CliveFPalmer
Explain that including biomass in the RET will rob Renewable Energy Credits and assistance/investment in genuine renewable energy like solar.
EEG LEGAL CHALLENGE FOR THE OWLS -
This wednesday 20th, EEG will be in mediation with both DELWP and VicForests over their obligation to properly protect our threatened owls. We'll keep you posted on that as well.
Horses being treated as commodities not as sentient animals
The DEPI should not be in charge of these abused and neglected horses! They are not a "primary industry", and even if they were livestock, this display of deprivation and starvation would not be acceptable. They are being treated as merchandize, as goods to be traded for $$ rather than sentient creatures with particular needs for food, water, space, and care.
The DEPI also manages policies on puppy farms, despite the fact that they are producing pets, not livestock!
If cars were to be for sale in car yards, they would have cleaners and detailers making sure they were shiny and sparkling, to their best advantage. Horses, that brought civilization and development to humanity, as transport means, war horses, vehicles for migration and travel, and machinery for ploughing fields for food, are just being treated as commodities - with no intrinsic value.
To contact DEPI online:
DEPI - contact us
Harsh measures may be necessary to stop global invasion of Syria
This was posted to the ongoing discusion on JohnQuiggin.com. The first two paragraphs below were accidentally omitted from that post.
Megan at May 16th, 2015 at 14:52 | #96 :
Thank you for drawing to our attention the dubious value of one source for that Wikipedia page. Given the complete failure of that Wikipedia article to even mention the Syrian Presidential elections held only last year on 4 June 2014, as I mentioned above, how could anyone consider anything from that Wikipedia page 1 as authoritative?
Megan wrote:
But, I would say "authoritarian" is probably an apt description.
The government of any country faced with an invasion by tens of thousands of sociopathic islamist 'converts' from every corner of the globe, armed and paid for by the medieval kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the dictatorship of Qatar, Jordan, Turkey, France, the United States and other allies, would have to resort to fairly harsh measures to defend its people, so I would not wish to quibble at length about whether or not the Syrian government should be labelled 'authoritarian'.
The critical point is whether or not the Syrian government represents the Syrian people and enjoys their support.
All the evidence of which I am aware, some of which I have posted above, shows that the Syrian government enjoys the overwhelming support of Syrians. This includes the article Syria's press conference the United Nations doesn't want you to see? It is about the UN Press conference of observers at the Syrian elections on 19 June last year?
Megan, could I suggest that you read that article and watch the embedded video? If you were find anything that you believe to be untrue in that article, certainly feel welcome to let me know here (or there – anyone is welcome to post to my site).
The war in Syria is not just a war against the Syrian government, it is a genocidal war against the Syrian people, including Christian Arabs, Armenians, a small minority of Judaic Syrians and Syrians of the Islamic faith, be they Alawite, Shiite or Sunni.
Footnote[s]
1. ↑ In contrast to the abovementioned Wikipedia page about President Bashar al-Assad, the Wikipedia page about Syria remains a helpful resource as of 16 June 2015.
It's not even Capitalism, it's lower than that
It's a capitalistic market, of pumping up prices and ignoring the discarded. We are NOT creating sustainable, stable communities.
The market isn't just Capitalist, it's a crony, scam market. Investors aren't Capitalists, they are rent seekers who are given a sheltered workshop style investing environment by the government. The government pulls out all efforts, tax payer funded, not just living tax payers, but those yet to be born, to ensure that the real estate market gets the outcomes it believes it deserves.
Capitalism is a harsh system, but it's made even worse by the fact that those with lobbying power are given exemptions from the harsh culling and reality that they would otherwise face. Capital Gains Tax concessions, Negative Gearing, First Home Owners grants, high immigration despite the lack of need, selective release and development of land and so on are all measures to make these specuvestors AVOID Capitalism. The LAST thing the real estate market wants, is true supply/demand Capitalism and a free market without intervention. They are reliant in intervention, on welfare and wealth redistribution to keep this false economy going.
Discussion on population growth Wheeler Centre
Wheler Centre Population Growth talk - 13 May 2015
Wednesday 13 May 2015, 6.15pm-7.15pm there was a Q&A session at The Wheeler Centre, Melbourne.
The session was mainly based on questions from the public, for a strict limit of one hour. There was concern that our cities were growing, and outstripping infrastructure. It was pointed out that Melbourne at 8 million is being compared to some of the massive mega-cities in Asia, but in actual fact it would be the second largest city if compared to those in Europe.
There were questions of migration, and basic human rights to feel safe, and free from persecution. Someone suggested the idea of open borders and globalization. It was boo-ed as being unsustainable. We would quickly be inundated by masses, and nothing could be planned or sustained.
Our planet is already in overshoot, and it's a reality that all the world cannot live like we do in Australia, Europe or the USA. The UN is urging us to take more refugees from war-torn, poor countries. Our population is 23 million. If we were to accept a million refugees a year, it would destroy our economy and social structure, without making any difference to an annual world population increase of 83 million.
If everyone lived like we do, though there are huge extremes, we would need 3 planets to sustain us. Our lifestyles were once the envy of the world, but now we are seeing third world living on our streets, and a polarization of wealth to the elites.
Prof Ian Lowe pointed out the our immigration is far to high, and that with high unemployment, we don't need skilled immigration. We could accommodate more refugees and concentrate of family reunions. If we had NO immigration, we could stabilize our population within 2 decades. With lower immigration, zero net immigration, we could stabilize by mid century.
Keynesian economics is an economic theory named after John Maynard Keynes, a British economist who lived from 1883 to 1946. Keynesian economics further concludes that there is a pragmatic reason for the massive redistribution of wealth: if the poorer segments of society are given sums of money, they will likely spend it, rather than save it, thus promoting economic growth. It means a free rein to the economy, and few regulations and restrictions. Thus, people are either "leaners" or "lifters", taxpayers and economic units instead of people with needs.
Of course, population growth is "good" for the economy, but not good for people. Already our environment is suffering and declining, and houses around Melbourne are being built on fertile soils - and we can't eat houses.
Another baseless claim of Syrian govt crimes against humanity
This is to be posted to a forum discussion on JohnQuiggin.com.
Ikonoklast wrote on May 16th, 2015 at 07:32 :
I note that Wikipedia and Amnesty International both I note that Wikipedia and Amnesty International both characterise the Syrian regime as authoritarian ...
I could not find where Wikipedia 1 "characterise[d] the Syrian regime as authoritarian and Bashar al-Assad as guilty of crimes against humanity including atrocities and war crimes." Could you please show where this claim was made?
Ikonoklast continued:
I see no reason to doubt these sources.
Amnesty's record on impartiality suffered a fatal blow when they stated in 1991 that Iraqi soldiers had torn babies from their incubators in Kuwait and left them to die on the floor of the hospital's neo-natal unit. Arguably this sealed the 1991 onslaught on Iraq. The story that the Kuwaiti government rewarded Amnesty with $500,000 for endorsing this pack of lies has not gone away – and as far as I am aware, to date, has not been denied. 2
As a consequence of the fraudulent "incubator babies" story, sanctions were imposed on Iraq for nearly two decades and Iraq was bombed extensively in 1991 and invaded in 2003. According to former United States Attorney General Ramsey Clarke as many as 3.3 million Iraqis, including 750,000 children died. 3
Ikonoclast wrote:
I wonder why people always assume that every conflict is a good guy vs. bad guy conflict? Actually, that is rare. Most conflicts are bad guy vs. bad guy conflicts. ...
I could ask: Why do ostensible humanitarians, rather than addressing the evidence presented to them, so often resort to the tired old "curse on both your houses" refrain?
As I have shown above, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has, on a number of occasions, subjected himself to close scrutiny by critical journalists, some who were openly unsympathetic. Show me where in any one of those interviews, even one of the allegations against him has not been refuted?
Bashar al-Jaafari, the current Permanent Representative of Syria to the United Nations, has on a number of occasions, held lengthy press conferences at the United Nations in recent years. Show me where, even once, the claims made by the mainstream and 'alternate' newsmedia of Syrian government crimes against humanity have ever even been put to him by journalists from the those same media outlets at those press conferences?
Footnotes
1. ↑ Incidentally, in its Syrian Demographics section, Wikipedia states :
According to the World Refugee Survey 2008, published by the U.S. Committee for Refugees and Immigrants, Syria hosted a population of refugees and asylum seekers numbering approximately 1,852,300. The vast majority of this population was from Iraq (1,300,000), ...
As one participant in those illegal wars and sanctions against Iraq from which all those Iraqis fled, Australia clearly owes Syria many millions of dollars in compensation for the trouble and expense that Syria has been put to as a consequence.
2. ↑ Amnesty International: An Instrument of War Propaganda? (8/8/15) by Felicity Arbuthnot- Global Research.
3. ↑ Former US Attorney General: US (and Australian) sanctions against Iraq are genocidal (8/8/15) by Felicity Arbuthnot- Candobetter.net, Breaking the Set YouTube Channel.
Syria a beehive attraction for foreign fighters
Thousands of foreigners are believed by intelligence services to have traveled from across the planet to fight in extremist groups in Syria and Iraq. They are like predators buzzing around dying prey! The flood of young men and women from all corners of the globe to join the Islamic State (IS) and other groups operating in the power vacuums of northern Iraq and Syria has prompted concerns among security agencies in their home countries over the potential threat they represent if and when they return.
Often they recent converts to Islam and sometimes, are scarcely able to articulate the reasons behind their decision to join the fight. These recruits are from a generation that came of age using social media, and their tweets and postings.
Secular moderates are almost gone -- and the Syrian war has become anything but Syrian. President Bashar Assad is often said to be "brutal", by a mass-media that uses tired and refuted 'evidence' of this, but now regional sectarian ties have turned Syria into an international battleground rife with fighters, funding and weapons from around the world.
Iranian's support into Assad’s forces began in late 2012, when the Free Syrian Army was making major gains, thanks to U.S. military advisers.
Hijra is an Arabic word meaning “emigration”, evoking the prophet Muhammad’s historic escape from Mecca, where assassins were plotting to kill him, to Medina. For most Islamic extremists today, the concepts of hijra and jihad are intimately linked.
Overpopulation, and immigration, has irrevocably been a force in the spread of Islam.
According to research conducted by Peter Neumann of King’s College London, along with Atran and others, the particular goal of establishing a state under Islamic law has shifted noticeably to establishing sharia law and supporting the institution of the caliphate, regardless of the wishes of the local Syrian population.
The United States has begun a long-awaited program to train Syrian fighters to go into combat against Islamic State, the Pentagon said on Thursday, deepening America’s role in Syria’s civil war after eight months of airstrikes against the Sunni militants.
U.S. military starts training Syrian fighters to combat Islamic State (7/5/15) | The Globe and Mail
Critics say that theoretical limitation is unlikely to withstand the realities of Syria’s messy civil war. The civil war has killed 220,000 people and displaced millions since 2011, despite repeated diplomatic efforts to resolve it.
Should Assad's government crumble, Syria could face greater instability and control by extremist groups, U.S. security officials are warning. The U.S. is watching closely to see if Iran and Russia step in to bolster Assad with weapons and supplies as they have in the past.
Remarkably, some media outlets reported that Assad told his visitors, "Some European countries are committing a grave mistake by allying with countries supporting terrorism."
The members of a Belgium delegation were reported as saying, "Syria constitutes the first line of defense in the face of extremism and terrorism. It is the only country fighting terrorism on the ground. If this line is defeated, terrorism will largely reach European countries. This is why we have to support Syria in this war." According to reports, the parliamentarians continued, "Many Western parties and officials now believe in this." This quote has been confirmed by former Lebanese Minister Wiam Wahhab, who told Al-Monitor he heard the Belgian delegation say it more than once.
Read more: Belgian delegation expresses support for Assad (17/5/15) | Lebanon Pulse
Any struggling nation, especially a secular one, could now follow this model of migration, extremism and military intervention.
Australia's growing homeless, the newest third world nation
The numbers of those sleeping rough in Sydney’s gritty inner streets is at a five-year high, a staggering 23 per cent increase since last August, and the beds that could rest them in emergency hostels and affordable housing are full. The numbers of those sleeping rough in Sydney’s gritty inner streets is at a five-year high, a staggering 23 per cent increase since last August, and the beds that could rest them in emergency hostels and affordable housing are full. The same story is in Melbourne, with people sleeping in our city's streets, and begging.
Daily Telegraph- Homeless people in Sydney grow in number as figures hit five year peak
Australia - the newest third world nation- caused by greed and an economy heavily reliant on population growth and the real estate market. It's not hard to recognise a Ponzi scheme when it's seen, and that's what our housing industry is! It keeps flourishing on new participants, investing more and more money, and discards the vulnerable and those who can't keep adding their wages and incomes! Governments are ignoring the impact of unaffordable housing prices, while the investors and wealthy (including foreigners) are accumulating wealth. It's a capitalistic market, of pumping up prices and ignoring the discarded. We are NOT creating sustainable, stable communities.
It's easy to pinpoint family problems, alcohol abuse, drugs, mental illness, unemployment and domestic violence, but they are all stemming from the same cause - we are NOT creating unified, cohesive, sustainable, and stable family-orientated communities. They are being broken apart and twisted by high population growth, the real estate industry's interests in maximum profits, and a neo-liberal policy from governments of giving market forces a free hand, without any impediments of control, regulation, concern for human welfare or social justice. What future do these young people have?
In spite of tragic losses, Syria gives hope to humankind
This was posted to a forum discussion on JohnQuiggin.com
Alfred Venison on May 15th, 2015 at 08:10 | #73
Thank you for your interest and support.
The history of Syria in the last years is, on one level, a vast tragedy, and on another level it gives hope and inspiration to the rest of humanity.
What other country, which has lost more than 220,000 lives out of a population of 17,952,000, that is 1.2% of the population, caused by an invasion of terrorist jihadists from almost every corner of the globe – armed and paid for by the United States, Saudi Arabia and their allies – since March 2011, could have not only endured, but maintained a vibrant cultural life? Check out the pages of the English language version of the Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) to see what I mean.
Unlike the 'leaders' of Australia, the United States, Britain, France, Israel and their allies, President Bashar al-Assad, so demonised in the lying mainstream Australian newsmedia, runs a truly popular and transparent government. He was elected by an overwhelming majority in elections on 4 June 2014. The validity of these elections was testified to by international observers at a United Nations press conference on 19 June 2014.
His government supplies more than what the Whitlam Labor government succeeded in giving by 1975. Every Syrian has the right to free education all the way up to tertiary level if they wish and medical care and other social services are provided free by the government.
On numerous occasions, President al-Assad has granted lengthy interviews even to journalists who are clearly not sympathetic to him and his government, including, for example 60 Minutes in January 2015. (Sixty Minutes only showed a fraction of that interview. You can find the link to the full unedited version of that interview here.) If only a fraction of the lies peddled about him were true, you would expect him to have been cut to ribbons in such interviews, but he never is. In every interview I have watched he has refuted the allegations made against his government with evidence and logic and put his government's case convincingly.
If Abbott, Bishop, Obama, Kerry, Hollande, Merkel, Poroshenko or Cameron allowed themselves to be subjected to such close scrutiny, they would be torn to shreds.
How does a Truck bomb attack on a hospital rate at the SBS?
Would it be better or worse than a 'barrel bomb' dropped on a group of insurgents firing mortars at residential areas of Aleppo? If worse, then why did SBS choose this stupid story which is so obviously false? Currently Al Nusra forces, backed aggressively by Turkey and Saudi Arabia, are attacking Aleppo, which had more or less come under the control and safety of the Syrian army. They are also expanding southwards near the border with Turkey, and a couple of days ago launched a massive truck bomb attack against Jisr al Shoghour National hospital, where 200 odd Syrian soldiers and civilians are resisting assault, the terrorists having taken over the nearby city. This video gives us an idea what a truck bomb explosion looks like, if we missed the one that Al Nusra previously used to blow up Al Kindi hospital in Aleppo.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LyQy7ELT9Rc
It seems that SBS is doing more than just 'poor' reporting - their recent Dateline program, which glorified and sanitised an AN terrorist on his way to Aleppo was one of many Western media productions to facilitate the new offensive against Syria's government and people.
SBS ignores complaint & repeats dangerous bias in war-reporting
SBS has failed to make any response to my formal complaint about their biased reporting on MH17, sent on 13 December 2014. (See above at /comment/reply/4223/152568#comment-152568.)
Today, 14 May 2015, SBS again showed extreme bias in a report on war in Syria where there is US/NATO interference. Tonight they reported again that Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad was using 'barrel bombs and poisonous gas'. See Chemical weapons and Was there a Chlorine Attack against Civilians in Syria or is it War Propaganda? Article by Susan Dirgham where you will also find discussion of so-called 'barrel bombs'. SBS used footage of a US spokesperson making these allegations, which continue to be ill-supported by very vague details that never succeed in proving their case against the Syrian government. Further the SBS commentator tonight suggested that the choice between the Syrian Government and ISIS was not much of a choice. On top of this they suggested that the Syrian Government had little success fighting ISIS and implied that the government was about to fail. It is as if, with the US/NATO/ISIS triangle unable to destroy Syria through arms alone, the mass media has determined to totally demoralise and artificially stigmatise the Syrian government and its people. This seems like a grotesque act of sadism, equivalent in moral and cultural terms to the brutality of ISIS.
SBS never balances these highly biased reports with relevant provable information, such as the fact that Bashar al-Assad was legally elected by a huge majority last year. This majority included many expatriates and was monitored by independent international visitors, who reported no abnormalities and whose testimony is available to all via UN broadcast. "/node/3888 How can SBS continue to ignore what the Syrian people want? What motivates SBS to comfort ISIS and serve the disorganising and brutal war activities of the United States and NATO?
SBS should be ashamed to thus has given comfort to US/NATO aggressors and ISIS. How could SBS be so naive - or corrupt - as to report as if it were fact, the propaganda that comes from the United States, despite the US's shameful record of starting wars in the Middle East on made-up stories, including 'incubator babies' and 'weapons of mass destruction'. The US is a candidate for international war crimes trials, for heavens sake!
SBS's biased reporting could spell the death of millions of Syrians who might otherwise survive if the rest of the world would get behind the Government and the Syrian army and allow them to defend Syria from its multiple attackers.
It is extremely distressing to witness such poor reporting by SBS, and to imagine the utterly disastrous consequences of this kind of reporting from SBS and other outlets in the West.
Nature's gardeners disappearing
"These (bandicoot) diggings increase soil turnover, alter plant community composition and structure, trap rainwater for better water infiltration, capture bio-mater for nutrient cycling, and add to fungal and seed dispersal". We need more of Nature's natural gardeners in our bush and forests. Our land is drying out, and thus governments in turn burn more and more landscapes for human safety. It's a destructive cycle of mammal extinctions, land clearing, declining water, and loss of fungus and bacteria that promote the fuel decomposition.
We have Nature's little gardeners, and other, disappearing off our land, and it's becoming drier, and more hostile to life.
Syria: Terrorism and Manipulation - a Revolution, video 1 of 3
Uploaded on 25 Nov 25, 2011
Part one of the 3 part documentary:
SYRIA: Terrorism & Manipulation - a Revolution
Behind the epidemic of global violence
Unstable food security and the recent international food price spikes were certainly one of their many grievances and was likely the factor that sparked the initial unrest, yet the level of unrest greatly varied in intensity throughout the Arab region.
Behind the epidemic of global violence is a cascade of food price spikes linked to worsening resource constraints - See more at: http://www.middleeasteye.net/columns/food-scarcity-fanning-flames-war-te...
Of the 17 countries identified as being most at risk of food riots, 14 are Muslim-majority countries, and at least 10 are subject to ongoing US-led counterterrorism operations. "Terror" is more than a conflict of ideals, and political instability. The peer-reviewed study, published last month in the journal Sustainability, builds on growing evidence that a lack of “access to critical resources, including food, energy and water, can, in certain circumstances, lead to violent demonstrations”.
“What we know is that the countries that actually experienced food riots were very fragile and hence there were underlying conditions that escalated the crisis.”
Some of these conditions have been exacerbated by climate change and energy depletion. In Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Egypt, all of which have experienced internal violence, intensifying water scarcity due to global warming has dramatically undermined domestic agriculture, while the depletion of conventional oil and transition to more expensive unconventional fossil fuels has reduced state revenues from oil exports.
The Middle East takes $8 billion worth of Australian exports, and the Federal Government has announced it wants to grow that. The Middle East's population is forecast to grow to 430 million people by 2020. Some countries in the Gulf rely on 90 per cent imports for their food. It leaves fragile communities to rely on supply chains of food, subject to political conditions and global trade prices. So, while Australia sends troops to Iraq to fight IS terror, it's also trading with countries in the Middle East.
The Middle East and North Africa on the whole is highly vulnerable to food insecurity and its resulting unrest. The Arab Spring was primarily a protest against governments calling for more political and civil liberties, and was fueled by long-held resentment stemming from a sense of moral outrage and injustice. Afghanistan has had a long-time food security issue. The desert regions of the Middle East struggle with food production, and many of the countries of the Arab Spring are big importers of their main food staple, which made them very vulnerable to price spikes.
For Saudi Arabic, relying on desalination plants, water has become more valuable than oil. It is not economically feasible to run desalination plants and provide water for farming or even parched cities. Besides the demand for water has increased while the supply has become scarce and unreliable.
Losing perspective on what life is about
It seems, through listening to the media commentary on the budget, especially with respect to child care that our society has lost focus on what should be life's purpose and pleasures. If we analysed from current discourse what is envisioned as our (Australians') purpose in life,what would emerge? Going to work seems to be right up there. Raising your own children which I would have thought to be a combination of one of life's great pleasures and great responsibilities, is very marginalised. Early childhood is a brief period with very rapid learning taking place. Would the majority, forced by economic necessity to hand over their 2 year olds to others for most of the day still do so if they had the choice?
I heard a caller yesterday on radio with a plea for adequate funds for child care reminding the radio audience that those who care for children are "raising the next generation of taxpayers". Had they just been people I guess she thought her comment would not have carried the same import. Also, yesterday in the parental leave context I heard someone pipe in, as though a piece of mammalian biology would be forgotten in the economic modal, that mothers should be allowed to breast feed their infants for 6 months because of the health benefits. That's nice, even dairy cows are allowed to feed their calves for a few days aren't they?
Reduce housing costs to 'balance budget'
The government and the opposition seem to want to entirely replace natural increase with economic immigration and for the Australian population to stop reproducing, work until they die, turn more of their superannuation over to the state, and reverse mortgage all their property so that the banks can resell it to the newcomers.
The reason we 'can't afford' housing, children, wages, and that small businesses cannot survive is because the cost of land, housing, water, power etc are all spiralling up due to population growth.
If we lower demand (by lowering population growth, i.e. immigration) we will lower the cost of living, the cost of doing business, pressure on wages, and make ourselves globally competitive and small business would thrive. You would not need two incomes just to survive, so you would not need lots of professional child care, rent supplements, constant employment, productivity increases (i.e. working more for less) etc.
But I have said this before, and better. One gets tired of repeating the obvious, since most people are conditioned to pay more attention to what they are told by the 'authorities' than what they see and experience personally.
Money, science and environment incompatible
I agree generally with what you are saying, and I didn't mean to imply that universities were scientific, nor that scientists were necessarily scientific. Science is a great thing but it can be worn like a cloak to dignify anything you say, just as priests may use religious clothing. The same abuse happens with media and government anointed authorities, be they scientific, religious, showbiz or the very wealthy.
Academia often doesn't support the scientific process and neither do the 'think tanks'.
Money distorts everything, especially where locals and people on the ground are sidelined for 'authorities'.
Is this conservatism?
The Liberals supposedly represent traditional values and conservatism. I didn't realise pushing women back to work while children were farmed out away from family to communal day care was a conservative value.
These child care subsidies just distort the economy, by creating a fake appearance that it is a viable economic proposition. It isn't. If the subsidies were removed, and the true cost was borne by people, many more children would be staying at home.
We are essentially paying for votes, and to create this mirage that somehow we can both raise our children and work by not raising them at the same time...
Academia has to support the scientific process first
This may have been the comment that was deleted.
There probably are enough neo-con think tanks and such. Academia has to set an example, and follow the scientific process though. Caving in to vocal pressure is not how science works. In doing this, they prove to people that the AGW position is politically motivated and enforced by censure and lobbying. This in my opinion, harms the ability for people to objectively assess the issue. It is counter productive and harms the goals of those who wish to see the issue addressed.
And it isn't just Lomborg. Any time someone who the establishment opposes wishes to speak, there is pressure and threats. This occurs more frequently than it should at uni, but pressure is also put on private businesses this way too. Want to hear a European politician who challenges the EU superstructure speak? If vocal political activists have an issue with them, your chances are diminished, as these people will "put pressure" on the hosting establishment, forcing them to abandon hosting, for their own safety, of course...
I also believe that many think scientists are somehow less biases, and that money only affects the scepticist side. I disagree. There is a lot of money that goes into climate change, and anyone who for a living studies something which is funded by government, or funded by anyone, is under pressure. Even to graduate, to get a professorship, this means one has to meet the requirements of someone else, who is biased. People seem to think that scientists are somehow, unlike any other profession, completely objective, that scientific truth is held by scientists, rather than discovered by the scientific process.
Apologies if your comment was deleted just now, ...
Dear contributors and guests,
I fear I may have just now, whilst removing forum spam, deleted a legitimate comment.
The post I deleted was from someone logged in from vic.optusnet.com.au .
I apologise for my carelessness.
If you have posted a comment this morning (or very late last night) Australian Eastern Standard Time and it has not appeared, could you please consider re-posting it?
I also recommend that each contributor always keep his/her own copy of their contribution, in case further mishaps such as this occur in future.
Thank you.
Childcare subsidies, two wage households and population growth
I have been listening to the budget foreshadowings- re child care subsidies. The thrust is that they want to get women out to work and it seems- if I got the gist right that stay-at-home mothers will lose out to 2 parent working families.
All these child care subsidies must compensate families for the fact that 2 people have to work to service the mortgage or pay rent when one pay packet used to be enough. The tax payer pays for this in taxes and society as a whole pays in services not provided (as the money is diverted into child care) Children lose out as each becomes one of a crowd in a child care centre instead of having the individual attention of his/her mother. This is a really heavy price we are paying for population growth and foreign investment.
I discussed this with a friend yesterday. My point was that I thought adult to child ratios were too low generally in these outsourced arrangements when child care facilities were involved. My friend is sort of the expert as she used such facilities as a single mother in the 1990s. She said that the rule for young children was a ratio of ¼. I said I thought that was to too many kids for each adult . She said –“Well my mother did it.” I said “But you were not a set a quads.” She acquiesced. (Her mother had 4 in just under 5 years.)
But these are the rules:
My interest in this was sparked by the child who was left in a car outside a child care centre in Kyneton for several hours and died. It said to me – “Too many young children for the number of adults.” My friend protested that it was his mother who had left him there. I said that this is not the point. In the transfer or whatever was happening, someone lost track and no-one checked. That’s what happens when people have too much to take care of.
Buyout morally indistinguishable to indigenous dispossession
Thank you, Nick for drawing our attention to this scam. The government and the selfish vested interests they represent are treating this generation of Australians no better than the indigenous Australians who were dispossessed before us. If they get away with this, the habitable territory on this continent will, in the not-too-distant future, be turned into a huge crowded urban slum.
Any state or Federal government that had the interests of today's native Australians at heart would have acted by now to end the selling off of our housing. They clearly do not represent us.
China's $60 billion Australian property splurge
One could make some academic criticism of the above post for not mentioning the large number of British, Irish, Indian and other buyers, but that would be hair-splitting. One must concede the overall case: it is obvious that the property industry is focusing on certain buyer groups and Chinese buyers are a noticable target, and the origin of such vast streams of money that Australian citizens are increasingly disadvantaged. They cannot compete and why should they? Australians have been conditioned - by a variety of stretched interpretations of multiculturalism - to fear punishment (ostracism) if they identify any particular ethnic group for anything but praise, yet how can one expect struggling Australians to stand mutely by when the mainstream media daily focuses on the cash or investment value of this or that ethnic group, and lately particularly on the Chinese, with this kind of announcement: "Chinese investors and immigrants purchased more than $8 billion in Australian residential property in the space of 12 months, with growing demand forecast to pump another $60 billion into the market over the next six years." (Sydney Morning Herald Business Day, May 17 2015.
To many this is catastrophic news.
There is a real problem in selling off our land and resources and in growing our population. Not only have the Australian public not been asked, but these policies are creating debt and dispossession. For this reason Nick Folkes's demonstration seems aptly focused.
It is very unfortunate that State and Federal Governments have allowed Australia's population growth and foreign investment situation to become so extreme that people feel they must protest outside consulats, but the situation is extreme.
More discussion welcome.
Protest foreign property buyers Chinese Consul May 30
Australia is under attack from greedy foreign intruders who are rapidly acquiring Australian residential property pricing locals out of the market. Aussie battlers are being pushed to the fringes of our cities while foreign intruders are reaping the benefits of hard working previous generations. The price of housing in Sydney and Melbourne has skyrocketed crushing the dreams and aspirations of young Australian families who are increasingly dispossessed. The new dispossessed or forgotten people will one day be remembered as the ‘stolen generation’ priced out of the market by invading overseas Chinese colonising our suburbs and cities.
The Australian dream of owning a residential home is rapidly becoming a distant memory due to the drastic increase in mass third world immigration coupled with foreign ownership. Housing affordability has become a smashed due to foreign buyers snapping up property at our expense.
In particular Chinese foreign ownership of residential property and assets is pushing the Australian prospective homebuyer to the fringes of society living in compromised living arrangements competing against foreign forces invited here by the policies of the major political parties who ignore the plight and struggles of young families seeking to progress up the economic ladder.
Struggling & isolated Aussie families:
Australians are feeling alienated and isolated in areas once considered safe and cohesive. Not only are Australians becoming a ‘stolen generation’ due to being priced out of the housing market, our families and children are feeling a loss of identity and community.
The ‘Aussie Dream’ has been shattered due to the greed of government, foreign speculators and invaders who are colluding together to ethnically cleanse suburbs of Australian families. Many of these hard working families are now trapped in a rental cycle struggling to pay over-priced rents competing against foreign intruders.
Segregated Chinese ghettoes:
Over the past ten years, Australia’s Chinese born population has more than doubled having an obvious impact on housing, jobs and schools. Chinese immigration has created a parallel society with Chinese preferring to live in areas with large Chinese populations creating segregated ghettoes. Chinese are increasingly turning to Chinese speaking property agents who are more than obliging to contravene Australian foreign investment rules in the pursuit of greed and conquest.
Chinese nationals are Australia’s largest foreign buyers of residential property and farms with recent figures showing over 20% of new residential property in NSW and Victoria sold to foreign nationals but contrary to the lies perpetrated by real estate agents (pimps) and government officials, they’re not just buying expensive properties. New figures reveal that around 70% of all sales to foreign buyers were below the $1 million mark.
Housing Bubble to Burst:
Australia is experiencing its worst housing bubble ever having the most indebted housing sector per capita in the world. An insatiable Chinese appetite for limited residential property has created a debt bubble as local families increase borrowings in the hope of securing a home. National mortgage and household debt has skyrocketed to over $1.9 trillion making the US sub prime collapse look like a walk in the park when our housing bubble bursts.
In particular, the Sydney property market has reached new unsustainable highs with the median Sydney house price now standing at $914,000 smashing local home ownership rates and creating more unproductive debt.
Illegal Occupation:
According to the FIRB (Foreign Investment Review Board) foreign nationals are not allowed to purchase residential property yet China has become Australia’s biggest source of approved foreign investment after a $12.4 billion splurge on real estate last year. Fat cat Treasurer Joe Hockey said the new figures was evidence Australia was “once again, open for business”. Indeed, ‘open for racial replacement or genocide of the Australian people’.
Thousands of Australian homes have been illegally embezzled and occupied yet the FIRB enforcement of foreign investment rules has been virtually non-existent with only two residential real estate purchases rejected last year.
Treasonous Politicians:
A recent parliamentary committee confirmed that local buyers were being squeezed out of the residential property market by foreign investors, particularly from China. The review found there were serious gaps in the enforcement of foreign investment rules.
Never before have we witnessed such treason from our elected politicians who have remained largely silent while the Australian Dream slips further away from working families. The plight of struggling Australian families ethnically cleansed from their suburbs highlights the treason and preference that our self-serving politicians give to foreign intruders over locals.
Genocide Demographics:
The economic impact of foreign ownership coupled with large scale Chinese immigration means more Australian workers are being displaced. Chinese residential property ownership means more immigration resulting in increasing competition for diminishing affordable housing, scarce jobs and university places. The effect of this invasion is far reaching with locals being pushed to the fringes, competing against Chinese workers who are known to work for less resulting in fewer jobs for locals and their children.
Demography is destiny, and with the full support of the major parties, Australia is undergoing a drastic demographic change. Traditional Australians are becoming strangers in their own land with many of our suburbs being turned into third world ghettoes riddled with crime, social friction and impending real estate bubble collapse. Current trends indicate Australians will become a minority in their own land within the next 30 years if present invasion figures continue.
Party for Freedom is a grassroots patriotic political party that represents the forgotten people. We need your support on the 30th May in sending a strong message to the Chinese government and Chinese nationals that their residential property purchases (ownership) in Australia is not welcome.
Pls. bring Aussie flags, and placards expressing your opposition to Chinese nationals raiding the local residential property market.
Facebook discussion group: https://www.facebook.com/events/697645543694220/
Where: Chinese Consulate,
39 Dunblane Street, Camperdown
Date: Saturday 30th May 2015
Time: 12 noon to 2pm
Meet: Front of Chinese Consulate
Clash of ideals
Danish political scientist Bjorn Lomborg has blamed "toxic politics, ad hominem attacks, and premature judgment" for the University of Western Australia's decision to pull out of his planned Australia Consensus Centre which would have advised on the best ways to tackle the world's development challenges.
Bjorn Lomborg blames 'toxic politics' for University back down on Australia Consensus Centre (9/5/15) | AFR
Lomborg has argued that climate change is real and poses problems, but is not as urgent a problem to the world as disease, poverty and lack of clean water. Surely climate change will exacerbate the latter, and so will population growth inhibit "development" of nations?
Rather than think-tanks, sponsored by governments, we have universities as business-like institutions, there to create an income flow for governments. Academics who want to build their careers need to play politics and stay on the "right" side, or be retired before they can be open and reveal objective and enlightened ideals. There's an idealistic clash between really dealing with the problems of the world, and with capitalist aims of big growth, profits, and globalisation.
Right wing think tanks and Lomborg
Don't you think we have enough right-wing 'think tanks?' I don't think that such a think tank would allow significant debate and would play by scientific rules, especially with 4m behind it and government support. You don't get rid of something like that with free and open inquiry. Not that our universities are great protectors of scientific method, due to the sway of the great dollar. So it is a bit amazing that the UWA and WA community stood on their hind feet for a little while on this.
Consensus by intimidation?
I wasn't aware that open and free inquiry involved caving in to vocal threats and pressure. This happens too frequently. Someone will want to speak, appear, and a vocal (usually minority) will issue vague threats and put pressure, and academia will fold like a deck chair in a cyclone.
Actions like this give credence to the argument that climate change is an ideology pushed by force for political purposes. These displays seem to give people reason to support this supposition, as it ostensibly appears to be exactly which climate change sceptics say happens to push the climate change ideology. It also reveals a lack of faith (and understanding, as if often the case) of the scientific process.
Anti-Immigration Party Wins a Seat in UK Vote
The U.K. Independence Party has won its first seat of the election, holding the eastern England. The party, which calls for Britain to leave the European Union and restrict immigration, had hoped to make an electoral breakthrough in this election. UKIP came a strong second or third in a number of constituencies but failed to win targeted seats.
With nearly 4 million votes, UKIP is now the third largest party in British politics in terms of vote share. Of course the media will downplay and find enormous delight in downgrading every flaw and inconsistency in the party and candidates!
It is disappointing that the country's outdated voting system means nearly 4 million votes for UKIP translates into a minimal number of seats.
Nigel Farage has been a dedicated public servant who, for five years, has led the conversation about immigration, the EU and so much else. For 10 years Farage has single-handedly kept the party together through sheer force of personality.
Many lessons of WW2 'hidden' in plain sight from Richard Overy
The RT 1 news service funded by the Russian government is a beacon of truth in a world of deceit of the corporate mainstream newsmedia. Had RT been around earlier, it is much less likely that the fabricated pretexts for war against Yugoslavia, Iraq, and Afghanistan would have been accepted and those wars could have been prevented.
Yet, for all its valuable contributions to truth and democracy, many of the journalists and reporters at RT still have considerable gaps in their understanding of of the history of the 20th century and of the part played by the Soviet Union.
British historian Richard Overy, when interviewed by Oksana Boyko on the Worlds Apart episode of 7 May put a somewhat flawed view about Nazism and Communism. Whilst she was able to challenge a number of Richard Overy's claims, she left others unchallenged. One was Overy's assertion that Josef Stalin was a brilliant and inspired leader who led and inspired the Soviet people to victory over Nazi Germany.
In truth, millions more lives were lost than should have been necessary to defeat Nazi Germany as a result of 1) Stalin's blind trust in Hitler prior to the start of Operation Barbarossa on 22 June 1944, and 2) Stalin's treachery towards his own people and allies before and during the Second World War.
As a result of the surprise Hitler/Stalin pact of August 1939, Nazi Germany was able to conquer Poland and Western Europe whilst having vast amounts of raw materials shipped across the border from the Soviet Union. So much was sent that even Soviet industry and Soviet consumers suffered from the shortages. 2
As Hitler was using these raw materials to wage war against the West, he was also using these materials to secretly prepare for his invasion of the Soviet Union.
Notwithstanding Stalin's unconscionable conduct towards Hitler, Western leaders including British Prime Minister Winston Churchill 3 and American President Franklin Delano Roosevelt understood that German Nazism, and not Communism, posed a mortal threat to humankind. They tried to warn Stalin of Hitler's plans, but Stalin ignored these warnings. When their intelligence services made them aware of these preparations, they passed on the warnings to the Soviet Union, but these warnings were ignored by Stalin.
Even Soviet agent, German communist Richard Sorge, who worked in the German embassy in Tokyo warned of the planned invasion, but his warning was ignored. A German soldier who swam across the River Bug to warn of the invasion, just prior to the invasion was shot for his trouble. 4
As a result the vast majority of Soviet soldiers were caught entirely by surprise on the morning of 2 June 1941. Hundreds of thousands were needlessly captured and killed in the first few months of the war.
Most of the more capable commanders of the Red Army, including Marshal Tukhachevsky, had been killed by Stalin during the Great Purges of 1938. They were murdered after show trials because Stalin feared that they may have held a residual loyalty to their former commander-in-chief Leon Trotsky, then in exile in Mexico. Had the Red Army been led more capably by these officers, the scale of sacrifice necessary to defeat the Nazi invasion would not have been nearly as great.
Footnote[s]
1. ↑ I previously understood 'RT' to have be the acronym for 'Russia Today' but this is apparently not the case.
2. ↑ I read this in World War Two - a Short History (2043) by Norman Stone but, unfortunately, can't cite the page number.
3. ↑ British Prime Minister Winston Churchill appears to have behaved commendably in the early stages of the war when he refused to make peace with Nazi Germany after its conquest of mainland Europe. Given that Churchill was soundly defeated by the Labor Party in the general elections of July 1945, it is not inconceivable that Churchill was motivated in part by wanting to hold on to power against the staunchly anti-Nazi opposition Labor Party
4. ↑ World War Two - a Short History (2043) by Norman Stone p58.
Oz media deprives readers of vital information
I just wish we could hear a Russian voice on the ABC arguing the Russian case, just once! Not only is that not the case, or if the Russian ambassador comments we only hear a fraction of what he said and it’s in a vacuum that extracts the relevant context, but there is nothing else available. The supplement that used to appear in the Age/SMH every month called ‘Russia beyond the Headlines’, stopped appearing after Christmas without satisfactory explanation – though it was not RBTH’s fault. The only other apparent printed or audible voice of Russia is in the Australian National Review, which has remarkably alternative articles, particularly about Ukraine and Russia. This month’s copy has sensible analyses about Yemen and about Kiev’s assassination of journalists, unreported in our press. But despite it being prominently displayed in numerous newsagents, people don’t seem to be buying it; locally I’m responsible for about 30% of all purchases in the last 5 months.
So even when you get a national newspaper printed with alternative viewpoints, you can still fail to break through the ‘bullshit blizzard’.
Uncle Sam's Scam; Is Australia that independent? Russian news
In an article in Russia's Sputnik news, Ekaterina Blinova writes, "In an interview with Sputnik, Australian social activists and members of Australia's Labor Party, Susan and Iman Safi, highlighted the problem of media misinformation in the West, Australia's deplorable political dependency on Washington and the role of Russia in global affairs.
"Western media, which is "best" represented by Rupert Murdoch's News Limited, has lost its honesty, independence, and the quest for investigative journalism. Where are today's equivalents of Bernstein and Woodford who broke the story of the Watergate scandal?" Susan and Iman Safi emphasized.
So far, according to the social activists, it is hardly surprising that Australia's media sources have jumped on the bandwagon of the US-led anti-Russia campaign.
Read more: http://sputniknews.com/analysis/20150505/1021730914.html#ixzz3ZSDRAdlI
Chinese to buy $60bn in Australian housing
Chinese investors and immigrants purchased more than $8 billion in Australian residential property in the space of 12 months, with growing demand forecast to pump another $60 billion into the market over the next six years. The number of first home buyers are dwindling, and thus our borders must be opened up to keep the Ponzi housing bubble inflated!
The Chinese money pumped into Australian housing was the equivalent of 15 per cent of national housing supply.
"We expect $60 billion of additional Chinese demand for Aussie housing over the next six years to 2020. This will be more than double the $28 billion over the past six years," according to a Credit Suisse analysis. The proposed new foreign investment rules may make Australian real estate less attractive for Chinese buyers, but that "the potential erosion of demand will be marginal". So, with all these cashed up property investors, extra tax is hardly a disincentive! This foreign-buy ups will be supported and accompanied by 2% new settler rates from China, while it was assumed the "investment" flows from Chinese buyers would grow at a rate of five per cent per annum. Living in this housing bubble is meant to bring great wealth for Australia? It's aimed at investors, not average Australians trying to buy into unaffordable housing.
The Australian: Chinese to buy 60bn in Australian housing
Baby boomers grew up with the assumption that if they had a full-time job, they could afford to buy a house –and pay it off in their working life. It was a hallmark of the egalitarian society Australians are so fond of remembering.
We had a lifestyle to be envied by the world. Thanks to high population growth, and tax benefits to favour investors, we have a working poor population that will never be able to afford to buy a house, flat or fibro shack in the ‘burbs. Malaysia and Thailand allow Australians to buy freehold property, but few other countries!
Bell Primary School, Preston, overloaded
Parents have slammed Bell Primary School’s reliance on portable classrooms 1 , launching a petition for the school to better cope with growth. Their seventh portable is now in use.
High population growth and distribution of permits for high density housing has pushed local schools to over their limits. The student numbers are clearly going to continue to increase, but parents are demanding that the school must find a solution rather than just putting in more and more portables. Planning has become synonymous with housing approvals, not actually catering for infrastructure demands and public services. Bell Primary is growing at a rate of about 60 enrolments a year, jumping from 343 students in 2013 to an expected 521 next year. Governments love and encourage population growth as being "good for the economy", but the benefits never are sufficient to cater for all the demands!
Sign the petition:
This petition is about planning for growth and engagement at Bell Primary School
Footnote[s]
1. ↑ See also: Parents protest use of portable classrooms at Bell Primary School in Preston (6/5/15) | Herald Sun , Students at over-crowded Preston school lose oval (4/5/15) | the Age.
They were not migrants, but backpackers
I did note when I watched the original broadcast that the two men they focused on were backpackers on a working holiday. This wasn't mentioned again, nor was it made clear about the women interviewed later. The Taiwanese minimum wage is $3.83 US hourly.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum_wage_in_Taiwan
Legal principle of non-refoulement a contradiction
European leaders are scrambling to find a way to stem the flow of migrants across the Mediterranean, after a large spike in deaths drew public condemnation. But, contradictorily, they have a policy of 'non-refoulement" which means that any operation would be obliged to observe this international legal principle meaning that people fleeing conflict or persecution are not sent back to a life-threatening place.
European Commission spokeswoman Natasha Bertaud also said that even if there were talks between Australia and Europe, they would never adopt Australia's controversial asylum seeker policy!
Another 5,800 migrants desperate to reach Europe were rescued this weekend as they tried to cross the Mediterranean, more than 2,150 of them on Sunday, the Italian coastguard said.
Bertaud said "the European Union applies the principle of non-refoulement," or no forced return under international law. "We have no intention of changing this. So of course the Australian model can never be a model for us," she added!
So, anyone who is "fleeing conflict or persecution" can't and won't be sent back. How many people in the world are facing conflict, persecution for numerous issues and challenges? It's an admission that there's no borders, and that anyone successfully arriving in a migration area of Europe will be accommodated! They may as well put out the WELCOME MAT and accept that the many deaths at sea are inevitable - or actually ferry them across?
Why the surprise?
What I can't understand is that there's so much surprise about "slave" migrant labour in Australia. Surely the aim of stamping and approving so many temporary visas with work permits to Australia is about a "flexible" labour force for Australia, and to dampen pay and working conditions. Surely this is for the benefit of businesses, and employers, and what Liberal governments aim for?
Even our "skilled" migrant intake can only be questioned at a time of high unemployment. Before we has chronic skills shortages, and now our explosive immigration rate is about offsetting an ageing population!
It's about bulking up Australia with human "muscle" and increasing our GDP by brute force, in absence of real productivity, innovation, manufacturing and knowledge-based promotions. Australia is doomed to be the next third world nation, with a huge economy! It's based on amassing human resources, and allowing the "Economy" greater access to cheap labour, with impoverished people who will be more motivated to work longer hours for less!
4Corners report on slavery in Australia today
What have we become? If life is like this for some people (and a few million chickens) it just makes the whole place hell. Exploitation seem always ready to rear its ugly head at the first opportunity/vulnerability.
Sir James Gobbo - role in Aust Multicultural Foundation
I also wonder about the roles of various officials of the organisation, like Sir James Gobbo, who is the "Emeritus Chairman" whatever that means. He used to be the Governor of Victoria, but Steve Bracks did not renew his terms, with the following reasons cited in a book extract at http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/book-extract-why-steve-bracks-replaced-sir-james-gobbo-as-the-governor/story-e6frf7kx-1226437987335
"INITIALLY, I was of the view that there was a good case for extending Sir James Gobbo's term for another 1 1/2 years, making it five years in total.
But as it got closer to the time when I needed to make my decision, I was made aware of a matter that concerned me.
The Governor was an occasional guest, formerly a full member, of something called the Rumour Tank, a group that had apparently been lunching together for years at Melbourne's Athenaeum Club. The get-togethers involved a range of people, but included Jeff Kennett and other Liberal Party identities.
There's nothing wrong with a lunch club, but the Rumour Tank also discussed state political matters and made some commentary on them.
Also, the progressive side of politics was not typically represented, so while there might have been one or two people who weren't members of the Liberal Party, the club generally had that party's character and nature."
Update membership Aust Multicultural Foundation
Dear candobetter.net
Just notifying you that Tony Abbott is now a member of the AMF. Has anyone noticed a change in his multicultural rhetoric since then? What is going on with this foundation and its hugely rich commercial associations?
Australian Multicultural Foundation Members and Staff
Members of the Foundation
The Hon. Tony Abbott MHR, Prime Minister of Australia
The Hon. Kevin Rudd
The Hon. Julia Gillard
The Hon. John Howard AC
The Hon. Robert Hawke AC
The Hon. Paul Keating
The Hon. Sir James Gobbo AC CVO
Dame Beryl Beaurepaire DBE AC
The Hon. Malcolm Turnbull MP
The Hon. Kim Beazley AC
The Hon. Mr Simon Crean
Mr Ivan A. Deveson AO
The Hon. Alexander Downer
Sir Llewellyn Edwards AC
Mr William Charles Fairbanks
Ms Gaye Rosemary Hart AM
Dr J. R. Hewson AM
Ms Vivien Suit-Cheng Hope
Mr Mark Latham
Mrs Irene Kwong Moss AO
Mr Robert Brooker Maher AM
Ms Wendy Elizabeth McCarthy AO
Mr Lindsay Gordon Crossley Moyle AM
The Hon. Andrew Peacock AC
Lady Stephen
Mr Ross Tzannes AM
Mr George Wojak AO MBE
Emeritus Chairman
The Hon. Sir James Gobbo AC CVO
Board of Directors
Professor Kwong Lee Dow AO (Chairman)
Major General Peter Maurice Arnison AC CVO
Ms Carla Zampatti AC
Professor John Nieuwenhuysen AM
Archbishop Christopher Prowse
Executive Director and Company Secretary
Dr B. (Hass) Dellal OAM
Training and Project Development Manager
Ms Lynn Cain
Administrative Assistant
Mrs Brigit Murikumthara
Project Co-ordinator
Ms Anneliese Brinkman
External Legal Consultant
Ms Azmeena Hussain
Citizenship for sale
The Productivity Commission is investigating a price-based immigration system that would use entry fees as the primary determinant for who gains entry to Australia. http://www.pc.gov.au/inquiries/current/migrant-intake/issues/migrant-intake-issues.pdf The radical proposal to allow migrants to pay their way to immigrate to Australia has been played down by Prime Minister Tony Abbott as a discussion paper, and not as a policy of the government. This Productivity Commission suggestion is of selling citizenship to Australia for the wealthy. This was not about skills, needs, costs, or family reunion- but hard cash to become an Australian.
It's said that such a scheme could help the government rein in the budget deficit by bringing in tens of billions of dollars in extra revenue and allow it to trim the number of public servants administering Australia's immigration system. The mining boom is facing, and even real estate sales have limits, so, in desperation for commodities on the world market, it's come to selling visas to Australia!
Mr Abbott also claimed that by preventing people smuggling boats making the journey to Australia, the government had saved half a billion dollars, ahead of this year's budget to be released next week. We may have "stopped the boats" and vilified asylum seekers, but we haven't stopped the planes!
The Productivity Commission issues paper on Australia's migrant intake, released on Friday, raises some dramatic proposals including introducing an immigration lottery and creating a HECS-style payment system for immigrants to pay back their entry fee. It's really an admission that our high population growth, driven by economic migration, is not paying it's way!
It's significant that this suggestion, of selling citizenship to Australia as a commodity, comes on the heels of the centenary of the patriotism and sacrifice of the Anzacs. Citizenship in Australia had some meaning, identity, and value. Now, it's suggested that the meaningfulness of any sovereignty and identity can be bought for $50,000! Estimates of the costs of infrastructure are actually much more than this amount! If the government really wanted to balance our nations budget deficit, the Productivity Commission wouldinvestigate the costs of immigration, in infrastructure, welfare, city congestion and declining productivity.
US hiding nasty secrets
Now an Internally displaced person cannot seek asylum in the US, and can be denied entry because this might be what she would do? This sounds like a cloak and dagger reasoning, to hide secrets, and this nun is now a threat to US security? She is Christian, not Islamic! Who is the real threat to world peace?
The US is denying the victims of ISIS to claim asylum. One wonders just how complicit the US is in propagating these wars, and don't want to be exposed.
The US and the so-called anti-ISIL coalition claim that they have launched a campaign against this terrorist and criminal group – while supplying them with weapons, food and medicine in Jalawla region (a town in Diyala Governorate, Iraq).
“The United States itself has been complicit in training the members of ISIS in Syria who later came to Iraq and began to input their essentially reign of terror on the Iraqis,” William Beeman, professor of anthropology at The University of Minnesota, told Press TV from Minneapolis last year.
Commander of Iran’s Basij (volunteer) Force, Brigadier General Mohammad Reza Naqdi, has stated that the US Embassy in Baghdad is a command base of ISIS, and that the US still “directly supports” the terrorist faction: “The US directly supports ISIL in Iraq and the US planes drop the needed aids and weapons for ISIL in Iraq”.
The ‘anti-ISIS’ Coalition of Deception. The Deceptive Nature of the War against the Islamic State (16/2/15) | Global Research republished from New Eastern Outlook
With such complexity in the anti-terror campaign, the US is obviously keen on selecting their information sources, and who is allowed to "talk" publically on this issue.
Pure political spin
"The Government recognises that foreign capital is vital to help grow our economy and provide jobs..." Just what "jobs" are provided for by selling our real estate overseas, and allowing property developers to spruik their wares in Australia?
Jobs in construction are short-term, and when population growth must continue to fill the towers and housing, it's actually adding to our unemployment rate.
What we need is foreign capital from productivity, innovation, knowledge, exports and industries, not brought in by pumping up the housing bubble from foreign buy-ups. There's no integrity in losing our sovereignty, and overloading our cities with unaffordable housing.
We need a real economy, with production, not an invasion of foreigners grabbing control of our housing, and discarding more people into social housing, a life of renting, or homelessness. That's not an industry, but a Ponzi scheme.
State health minister slams new federal policy
Ballarat health, Victoria, stands to lose $364 million in federal funding over the next 10 years, according to an analysis conducted by the state government. She said the result would mean longer waiting times for emergency treatments and elective surgeries in Ballarat.
"These cuts will be disastrous for the Victorian health system and have horrendous consequences for regional Victoria," Ms Hennessy said.
The federal government has maintained a change was needed to "deliver a more efficient hospital system into the future and it has outlined that hospital funding under the Abbott government continued to rise each year."
So, the implication is that our health care system is inefficient, and wasteful, and needs to be trimmed. On the contrary, numbers of patients have been exploding, and waiting lists blowing out, causing suffering and even deaths! They cut funding then claim it will "rise" each year?
Ballarat is regional Victoria’s leader in population growth, with new figures indicating the city grew by almost 2 per cent in a year. ABS revealed Ballarat was the top regional centre for annual growth in Victoria and New South Wales.
Our Federal and State governments all endorse high population growth, and that "immigration is good for the economy", but they not only fail to provide sufficient services and infrastructure for this heavy "growth" model, they end up slashing funds for something as basic as health care! How can more be done, with less?
Health care is not an optional extra, a luxury, but basic as a first world country, and to our well-being. After more than 2 decades of "economic growth", why are we getting poorer, and why is our economy failing? The basic needs of people are being compromised, and there should be outrage over these savage cuts to health.
VicForests cleared of illegal logging!
The Government has been investigating claims the state-owned timber company illegally logged and destroyed ancient rainforest canopy species on the Errindura Plateau.
The Goongerah Environment Centre alleged the state-owned timber company had logged about one hectare of rainforest on the Errindura Plateau. The group's spokesman, Ed Hill, said according to the Flora and Fauna Guarantee Act, any rainforest areas bigger than 0.1 of a hectare must be protected. It appeared to be bigger than .4 of a hectare. Goal-posts can easily be moved with State endorsement, and the FFG Act is mere paper, which no doubt is exempt from logging industries.
The investigation found VicForests had not breached logging codes for rainforest protection and waterway harvesting.
This is simply how VicForests operates! They are quite "legally" chopping up these massive and iconic trees, 600 years old. That's how VicForests operate - without scrutiny, without environmental limits and quite legally can vandalize our State's natural treasures. These "harvesters" are sanctioned by the fat-cats in Spring Street.
ABC: Vicforests cleared over East Gippsland
With State government sanction, nothing is "illegal" if it's done under the banner of VicForests - our own environmental vandals!!!
Family Trusts in direct conflict with fleecing pensioners
Family Trusts are a reasonable way for families to unite and support each other. This is the bedrock of society. But when a wealthy individual distributes income to reduce tax liability that individual should also accept social responsibility for his children.
Consider a bloke with $20+million who on the one hand uses a Family Trust to reduce tax liability. But then when his well heeled children move out of home or are unemployed after years of tertiary education, they can claim student benefits and unemployment benefits as if they are not part of the Family Trust that allowed their parents to shelter from tax over many of the previous years.
And then you have pensioners who might want to leave the family home to children who are far less fortunate than the heirs to Family Trust fortunes. These pensioners are to be stripped of an asset that effectively also belongs to their offspring. These are families who have struggled to support each other through good times and bad.
The poor get stripped of their assets and the rich kids collect the dole and other student benefits despite being heirs to large fortunes?
Only politicians could construct the foundations for such idiotic inequity.
Absurd libel against Syrian govt. by Australian Kurdish group
The claim by a supposed 'leader' of the Australian Kurdish community that "ISIS was established by Turkey, Iran, Syria and Iraq, purely to fight the creation of our nation" is an absurd libel against the governments of Syria, Iran and Iraq.
Only those kept ignorant of the facts of the conflicts in Syria could possibly not know that ISIS is a creation of the Arab dictatorships of Saudi Arabia and Qatar to overthrow the secular government of Syria. That terrible war, which commenced in March 2011 has already cost the lives of 220,000 Syrians. In that war the Kurds in northern Syria have so far been allied with the Syrian government (although in the 4 Corners program of 27 April 2014, No Free Steps to Heaven – reviewed on candobetter and available on iview until 25 May – it is a concern that the program reporter was from Israel, itself now overtly supporting the Syrian 'rebels' who are clearly fighting on the same side as ISIS).
New Matilda on Maori solidarity with Aboriginal land-struggle
The Maori's Are Coming: Solidarity From Across The Ditch Against Forced Remote Community Closures
By Padraic Gibson
Keywords:
paddy gibson
teanau tuiono
remote community closures
There’s growing opposition to the forced closure of remote Aboriginal communities. And not just in Australia. Paddy Gibson reports.
Teanau Tuiono is a Maori activist helping to build solidarity in Aotearoa (New Zealand) with the movement against the forced closure of Aboriginal communities in WA and across Australia, including NZ protests on the upcoming Day of Action, Friday May 1.
Here he speaks with Padraic Gibson from the Jumbunna Indigenous House of Learning (UTS) about the common struggle of Indigenous peoples against settler-colonialism.
Read more of this article at https://newmatilda.com//2015/04/30/maoris-are-coming-solidarity-across-ditch-against-forced-remote-community-closures
New Matilda has a pay-wall but you can read about 3 articles weekly for free. Although it seems to cover mostly the same topics as the mainstream, I gather it is trying to develop beyond that.
Framing the Liberation War in Donbass
Beyond Left and Right, Beyond Red and White:
Framing the Liberation War in Donbass
An interesting article by Nina Kouprianova on the conflict in Ukraine which provides a fresh perspective we don't get exposed to in our media.
Russia seems to represent a "regression" from modern Liberalism and it is here I think the West sees a threat. Russia, and in particular Putin encapsulate many aspects we thought we "moved on" from, perhaps due to Russia's isolation from modern Liberalism post WWII. The conflict is largely ideological, something I believe Putin is keenly aware of. He understands that Western Europe's modern Liberalism is detrimental to Europe's spiritual and demographic future. This challenges the very core of neo-Liberalism, as do many European populist parties such as the Front National.
The year 2014 saw an unprecedented surge of patriotism in contemporary Russia, which resulted in popularizing the notion of the Russian World. One reason for increased patriotic sentiment was Crimea’s return to the home port after the overwhelmingly positive vote by its majority-Russian residents in a referendum one year ago. The onset of the liberation war in Donbass from the West-backed Kiev regime was the other. This war truly delineated the stakes for the existence of the Russian World. The latter is not an ethnic, but a civilizational concept that encompasses shared culture, history, and language in the Eurasian space within a traditionalist framework. To a certain extent and despite the obvious ideological differences, the Russian Empire and the USSR embodied the same geopolitical entity. A particularly noteworthy aspect of the ongoing crisis in Donbass is the symbolism—religious and historic—that surpasses the commonly used, but outdated Left-Right political spectrum. In the Russian context, this also means overcoming the Red-White divide of the Communist Revolution. That this war pushed Russians to examine their country’s raison d’être is somewhat remarkable: for two decades its citizens did not have an official ideology, prohibited by the Constitution that is based on Western models. The emergence of a new way of thinking in Russia will become clearer once we refer to the meaning of religious insignia, wars—Russian Civil and Great Patriotic, as well as the question of ideology in the Postmodern world.
Purported Kurdish politics in Australia
You may be interested in the claims of a leader within the Kurdish Australian community. (See below) This was reported in an article in "the Saturday Paper" about the death of an Australian who joined the Kurdish forces.
"But Kurdish groups in Australia say they actively discourage Australians joining their ranks. They have been keen to use Johnston’s situation to build a case for greater humanitarian and Australian military support for the Kurds and the opening of channels for this aid between Turkey and Syria. Australian Kurds are also campaigning to have the Kurdistan Workers’ Party delisted as a terrorist organisation here, a move that would prevent those supporting the PKK being prosecuted under some anti-terrorism legislation.
“We recognise the sacrifice Ashley made of his life for our cause. Ashley was a good person who just felt the Kurdish people needed help,” said Abdul Wahab Talibani, secretary of the Kurdish Association in Sydney.
“The Kurdish people have a big problem … ISIS was established by Turkey, Iran, Syria and Iraq, purely to fight the creation of our nation. But we have over 40 million Kurds who are ready to fight … our people are more than capable. We need weapons and tanks … but we don’t need others to come and fight.”
The AFP has expressed concerns a martyr’s memorial may encourage further recruits. Opinions also remain divided over whether delisting the PKK as a terrorist organisation would lure other recruits."
An obligation to act on poverty
The "economic growth" model, one that's continued for over two decades, is not true to it's name! Our economy, in absolute terms, no doubt IS increasing in size, with regards to the amounts of currency and transactions in circulation, but it's not increasing our wealth but creating more poverty and cost cutting. A recently released Committee for Economic Development of Australia report titled "More than a million Aussies living in poverty a disgrace" reveals that as many as 1.5 million Australians are living in poverty".
Up to 6 per cent of the population, are "classed as being in entrenched disadvantage, with little to no hope of getting out of that situation," reported commission chief executive Stephen Martin.
http://www.theage.com.au/comment/the-age-editorial/an-obligation-to-act-...
Governments can't simply ignore the poverty as "bad luck" or distance themselves from it!
"The past 20 years had essentially been a massive failure by successive governments to address entrenched disadvantage and policies have been economically short-sighted," Professor Martin said. It's assumed, in the advancement of The Economy and business interests, that some people will fall off the bandwagon and into poverty. It's pure and evil neo-liberalism and focus on monetary values at the detriment of the public. Human welfare can't just be igmored and discarded because of budget cuts that the public have no control over.
Mr Abbott and MrHockey are now afforded the chance to reverse 20 years of social and political mismanagement.
There needs to be an assessment of the costs and benefits of this "economic growth" model. If it's failing the majority, and only feeding the wealthy, it needs to be dropped!
A group of scientists, known collectively as the Club of Rome, constructed a detailed mathematical model to test whether population growth and economic development could continue indefinitely and if not, what the limits to growth and its manifestations would be. The standard future scenario in their computer projections showed positive growth in both the population and the economy until the mid-21st century - and then a decline. People are now expected to assume that social welfare benefits, plus health care and education, are not basics any more that they are entitled to.
We are seeing degenerative symptoms on our society, of dis-eases of drugs, unemployment, domestic violence, crime and homelessness.
If houses must be liquidified to pay for pensions, and their main assets - their own homes - can't be passed onto future generations, we've come to the brick wall of ecomomic growth's limits! Who really benefits from continuing with our failing "economic growth" model? Banks, corporations, multinational companies, and the capital owners are all using people are commodities, and while we accept our increasing poverty it will continue "business as usual"!
That's it! No historical context
Thank you, Dennis. You have put your finger on it! The War or wars were wall to wall yesterday on most channels but they were not educational and it just amounted to a day of wallowing in it.
Lack of history in the ANZAC coverage
I noted during the "coverage" of the ANZAC day commemorations a lack of history. Channel 9 had many stories, and as is typical for mainstream media, a rundown of emotions felt (as is the case with reality TV too). It seemed largely an introverted affair aimed at broadcasting the specific emotions which this poorly understood campaign is supposed to ellicit. It was basically "How does ANZAC day make you feel?".
There was no rundown, at all, of the historical context of the war, or the landings. You could watch this for hours, and be none the wiser as to why they were there, or what the war was fought for, or what the strategic aim was, or the political situation which made the war seem necessary. No understanding of the world at the beginning of the 20th century. There was lots of focus on the emotion of the event, but surprisingly, virtually nothing from the soldiers themselves, no retelling of first hand accounts, no revisiting the news, the analysis and experiences and thoughts of the time. The soldiers themselves are simultaneously lionised and blotted out. I watched expecting maybe a retelling of their personal experiences, a diary entry, anything, these are abundant, but nothing.
Sadly, this is how the powers use war. They reinvent wars for their purpose, but stripping out the historical context, and then claiming (falsely) that the war as about reinforcing the PRESENT day morality. All you have to say is that the soldiers 100 years ago fought for our values TODAY, and you get a moral one-up over others. Although never explicitly stated, it is strongly implied that government action today is endorsed by the dead heroes because this is what they fought for. World War 1, World War II, these are reinvented to support the status quo today, a status quo which would have been rejected back then.
And because people aren't educated as to what people used to think, they can fall for it.
Our planet's instability in present times!
A massive earthquake has killed more than 1457 people as it tore through large parts of Nepal, toppling office blocks and towers in Kathmandu and triggering a deadly avalanche at Everest base camp. It's the nation's worse disaster in 80 years, but the final toll from Saturday’s 7.8-magnitude quake could be much higher. Dozens more people were reported killed in neighbouring India and China.
The worst damage was in Kathmandu, where the historic nine-storey Dharahara tower, a major tourist attraction, was among buildings brought down. An estimated 4.6 million people in the region were exposed to tremors from the Nepal earthquake, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said. In Nepal, 30 out of 75 districts were affected by the quake.
Major historic monuments in the Nepalese capital have been destroyed in the powerful earthquake, eyewitnesses and officials have said. These include a nine-storey tower, temples and some parts of what was once a royal palace, all listed as Unesco world heritage sites.
On the other side of the planet, the volcano Calbuco has blown its top twice in recent days, sending a huge cloud of ash in to the air and forcing thousands of people to leave their homes. This week was the volcano's first eruption in 42 years. Ash from the volcano in Chile, which erupted without warning this week, has reached as far as southern Brazil on Saturday and prompted some airlines to cancel flights to the capitals of Chile, Argentina and Uruguay.
About 1,500 people in Ensenada, in the foothills of the volcano, were told to evacuate earlier this week, essentially turning it into a ghost town. The dust could contaminate water, trigger respiratory illnesses and halt more flights. More than 4.000 people have been evacuated.
The 6,500 foot Calbuco last erupted in 1972 and is considered one of the top three most potentially dangerous among Chile's 90 active volcanos.
Yellowstone National Park is the home of one of the world's largest volcanoes, and is capable of erupting with catastrophic violence at a scale never before witnessed by human beings. This would be a disaster felt on a global scale, which is why scientists are looking at this thing closely.
While we are warehousing more and more people in mega-cities, the risks of living in an unstable planet are mounting. Megacities – urban areas with populations exceeding 10 million people – already exist on five continents, and the number and size of these areas are growing. According to UN estimates, almost two-thirds of the world’s population will live in urban areas by 2040.
Weather-related disasters, such as drought, floods and hurricanes, temporarily displaced some 20.6 million people in 2013. Add to that the growing millions that are displaced due to poverty, conflicts and terror!
The Asia-Pacific region experiences some of the world's worst natural hazards-frequent earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, cyclones and annual monsoons. It also includes many of the world's megacities-those with more than 8 million people-so the number of people exposed to hazard risks in the region is very high. A volcanic eruption on an uninhabited Alaskan island is unlikely to be a disaster, but a similar eruption in the densely populated Asia–Pacific region could be catastrophic. Many such growing urban areas will also be situated along the world’s waterways and will be especially vulnerable to the unfolding effects of climate change, including increased sea levels and more severe natural disasters.
Anti-war message at Deakin Edge
Last night’s anti-war event (mentioned above). “The War to end all wars” (held at Deakin Edge on the 24th of April at 7.30 pm with Peter Cundall (Garden guru and veteran of three wars), Kellie Merritt (Social worker and widow of Paul Pardoel, who was killed in Iraq) and Adam Bandt, MP for Melbourne) was held under the auspices of “Health professionals promoting peace” The stand- out talks were delivered by Kellie Merritt, the first war widow of the Iraq War (2005) and Peter Cundall, best known as a TV garden expert and personality but whose 88 years of life have brought him face to face with theatres of war and the results of war.
Kellie Merritt fiercely questions the pretext of Australia’s involvement in the Iraq War and whether her husband’s death had any valid point. She advocates an inquiry into Australia's involvement in the Iraq War parliamentary debate for any future decision to commit Australia to armed combat overseas rather a than a PM “Captain’s call”.
Peter Cundall gave an enthralling passionate speech about his life experiences as a child in post WW1 Britain seeing the war injured all around him, his nightmarish experiences in service in WW2, in Europe and Palestine. He described his decision to come to Australia for some peace only to find himself in an equally ugly war in Korea. He deemed war to be based on greed for resources and territory and opposed it in no uncertain terms.
A sour note, however
The talks were punctuated by 3 community/school choirs of high standard, one of which managed, in my view to hit completely the wrong note with a made- up song about how Australians who own houses are intolerant of migrants from a diversity of regions and cultures (!) This was to me a total unnecessary unsophisticated and unjustified put-down of Australian people.
The choirs involved in the event were Shaking the tree (with offending song), Melbourne Singers of Gospel, the Mesopotamia band and students from Brunswick Secondary College.
A chilling coincidence: Armenian genocide commenced 24 Apr 2015
The following was recently posted to the [nosyriaintervebtion] mailing list;
I find the near coincidence of the commencement of the Armenian genocide on 24 April 1915 with the Gallipoli landings the next day to be chilling. By the estimate given by Speaker of the People's Assembly Mohammad Jihad al-Laham (see article above - Ed), more than half a million Armenians perished in the genocide.
Had the Gallipoli landings actually helped prevent or reduce the scale of the genocide, it may be possible to justify the sacrifice the deaths of 8,000 Australians out of the total 44,072 allied fatalities at Gallipoli.
However, as far as I am aware, the campaign did nothing to reduce the scale of the genocide. Conceivably, it may have caused the Ottoman rulers to increase the scale of genocide.
Whatever the truth, no narrative of the Gallipoli campaign, that I have read, has placed the campaign in the context of the Armenian genocide. (Neither have any of those narratives placed the campaign in the context of the nearby Balkan conflicts of which the First World War was merely an extension for the people in the region.)
The supposed subsequent reconciliation between the soldiers of two sides that were trying to kill each other in 1915 seems to me to have largely been a consequence of the Australian and Turkish Governments having become effectively allied against the new Russian government of Vladimir Lenin which created an autonomous republic from Armenians to live in and which supported that republic militarily against Turkey.
Petroleum testing in marine sancturies
This comment has been posted to the front page as an article. Miscellaneous comments on this page have now been closed. Please post further miscellaneous comments here. - Ed, (25/4/15)
War should never be glorified
It's tragic that the carnage of Anzac, Gallipoli, did actually form us as a nation, and put Australia on the world map. Australia was a "young" nation in European terms, recently independent as a Commonwealth from Britian 1901. Australians were clearly a tough bunch, and indebted to their "Mother" country, Britain.
Just go to any small town or city and see the memorial crosses, the cemetery statues, and the halls commemorated to the Anzacs, and the Great War. The impact was massive, and the losses to Australia horrendous. We need to honour and respect the sacrifices made by these volunteers, and remember the heavy costs of war, and the horrendous suffering. However, we should not glorify war, or make it our signature of our nation.
Visiting Gallipoli has become a rite of passage for Australians, but it's probably a mystery for many immigrants, who don't have connections to our past. However, war should never be glorified, and our nation's identity should never be forged by the trenches, and "brave" dead, but be based in high morality, and peace. How many of these soldiers were mere young boys, out for adventure, not to be served as a sacrifice? Australia was not directly under threat from Germany's alliances.
After 100 years, Anzac day should be put aside, and put to rest inside the history books with the respect and honour it deserves.
Crude cementing with Gallipoli
Note, however, the very crude attempt to 'unite' us all over Gallipoli. It is as if this is the only thing that young people are going to be allowed to identify with as Australians - the 'glory' of war. It seems that young Australians are being prepared for endless wars in the most cynical way and with full cooperation of the corporate press. And people are not falling for this as they are expected to do. This morning a health professional asked me what I was doing tomorrow for the 'Dawn Service'. I had to think for a moment what he meant, and then realised that he meant some Gallipoli 'celebration'. I replied that I would probably be writing articles against war-mongering. He laughed and said it was a bit like that. He added that it was like we are already engaged in the third world war, but made up of little wars everywhere, never stopping. I said, Yes, beginning with Yugoslavia. We agreed.
How many Australians can see through their governments and corporate 'leaders' and press, but do not realise they can speak up against this sickening manufactured consent by writing for candobetter.net and for any other alternative media that isn't trying to sell ads.
Australians must speak out in any way they can.
There is an anti-war event at Federation Square tonight. One fears that there will be little if any criticism of the way we are backing wars in Syria and East Ukraine, and taunting Iran. (Although I must say that I am glad our foreign minister visited there recently. Maybe there was actually a chance for real dialogue behind closed doors, for once.)
Social division is engineered
I think that social division is being fermented by members of the government, and by powerful elites through mass media. They are dividing ordinary people both latitudinally and longitudinally like a cutter on a tray of biscuit mix. These forces pitch one generation against another, (equivalent to parents against children), neighborhood against neighborhood (in the struggle to withstand unwanted development) , residents of middle suburbs against those from outer suburbs,( with rapid population growth and poor infrastructure and planning, badly affecting the latter), country against city (e.g. piping water from country to city) and "lifters against leaners". All this stirs up resentment, prevents us from seeing ourselves as one people and is counterproductive to rational thought. The very rich are laughing all the way to the bank.
We cannot fight this unless we articulate it.
There is no such thing as a guest worker program
Guest worker programs are ALWAYS permanent. ALWAYS.
There is, practically speaking, virtually no difference between a guest worker program, and a permanent migration program.
Guest worker programs fail.
But there is another issue. The lack of debate means that the ONLY people who will vocally, and totally oppose this in an organised manner will be the reactionaries.
Sometimes I think our state is doing everything it possibly can to breed a far right movement in Australia. It is almost as if our government is begging for social division.
Good distillation of Kelvin's speech, James
Thank you James for distilling these points from Kelvin's very informative speech. It was as much as I could do to edit and publish it in a timely fashion, but it is comments like these that assist people quickly seeking the guts of a speech.
Mass immigration would end if beneficiaries paid its true cost
Kelvin Thomson proposed that
... the property developers who are the beneficiaries of the increased land value that comes from population growth ought to be the ones to pay for the costs of this growth
If the beneficiaries were made to pay the true costs of high immigration it would end very quickly. No articles in support of high immigration that I could find have shown showed any tangible benefit that Australia has gained from high immigration in recent years. Take for example, Immigrants and the economy are inextricably linked in the story of Australia (9/4/15) | the Age.
The article commences:
"George Megalogenis' three-part ABC documentary Making Australia Great 1 has had a very positive response. ..."
The article continues:
"From the data, Megalogenis looks up to the wider horizons of what it tells us about ourselves and our story and, crucially, he puts economics where it should be, at the heart of a story with many related facets – politics, history, culture, and identity. All interpenetrate. To see any one in isolation is to only partially see how society works and changes."
None of the claimed data is cited in Alex West's article. I have yet to see any data which shows that high immigration is beneficial to the current inhabitants of Australia. The true economic effects of high immigration is given in Kelvin Thomson's speech:
- Government cost of maintaining infrastructure doubles if population grows by 2%;
- The $8 billion cost of the (now abandoned) East-West Link;
- 500,000 15-19 year olds with full-time employment in the 1980's compared to only 150,000 in Jan 2015;
- 20% of 15-19 year olds with full-time employment in the 1980's compared to 75% today;
- Tertiary education, once free, only available to the rich;
- Highest youth unemployment in 17 years;
- Long-term unemployment has more than doubled since 2008;
- More than 2,000,000 casual workers;
- More than 1,000,000 contract or labour hire workers;
- Further increases in housing costs;
- Fewer Melburnians living in detached homes as high-rise apartments being built in Melbourne at 4 times the density allowed in New York, Hong Kong and Tokyo;
As numbers of our cities' inhabitants swell on this arid continent, ever more bushland and farmland in regions adjoining our cities are being destroyed to build more housing. As a consequence, ever more of Australia's unique fauna and flaura are threatened with extinction including the Leadbeater's possum.
Those living on the edges of our ever expanding cities are forced to spend ever larger proportions of their day commuting to and from work.
Even if a minority are able to gain from high immigration, Australians, as a whole, lose terribly. Unless it is stopped, both current Australians and new arrivals are destined to suffer environmental and economic calamity.
If beneficiaries of high immigration were forced to pay all of its true costs, it would end immediately.
Footnote[s]
1. ↑ It was not possible to view the series as ABC only makes a program available on iview for 14 days after its broadcast. (The web page of part 3 only dated 31/3/15 was found here and its no-longer functional ivew page is here.)
Bishop casts doubt over Australian asylum policies in Europe
Prime Minister Tony Abbott on Monday said Australia had shown the only way to stop the deaths “is in fact to stop the boats’’ and urged European countries to adopt ‘’very strong’’ policies.
Foreign minister Julie Bishop has suggested the strict Australian policy of turning migrant boats back might not work for Europe as it grapples with the flood of people smuggling operations across the Mediterranean.
The Australian: Julie Bishop casts doubt over Australian asylum policies in Europe
Geographic circumstances are very different between Europe and Australia, Bishop said. There is an effort to clamp down on people smugglers after the horror of more than 1300 migrants dying in two major boat capsizes off Libya in the past week. Successfully accommodating the "migrants" puts up a green flag for more to come!
Commenters note that "Africa was much better under colonialism. Rhodesia was one of the richest countries in the world, now look at Zimbabwe today! Same for South Africa, visit it before it falls apart entirely". ..." and so was Libya, Chad, Somalia, Ethiopia, and 90% of the rest of Africa, but the usual do gooders , Fraser one of them, decided otherwise, the natives are now the one that suffer". It's Western intervention and colonialism that's ruined any family or tribal community structures in Africa.
The West meddled too much, especially when it brought new crop strains and basic medicine to Africans, enabling their explosive population growth that is keeping them poor, violent and unable to evolve beyond their current stage of development.
Migrants leaving from north Africa for Italy do so overwhelmingly from Libya, though there are also routes to Italy from Egypt and Morocco, and from Turkey to Greece. The estimated cost of getting to Libya varies from about $200 to $1,000 from west Africa, and from about $1,000 to $6,000 from the Horn of Africa.
The people are fleeing some mixture of war, oppression, civil disorder and poverty. Most of the migrants are young men. The most immediate is a population explosion which has seen sub-Saharan Africa’s population increase from barely 200 million in 1950 to just under a billion today. There needs to be efforts to rebuild these failed nations, not keep accommodating into Europe, overstretching their resources.
Aid agencies are pushing pop growth to artificially high levels, which means that rhinos, elephants killed for their horn/tusk as more and more men see it as a way to make money, and fund Islamic terror groups. We should all just leave Africa and let them sort it out themselves, our interference in this continent just makes things worse.
Lower income families worse off