I have never read anything less edifying than the Thomson letter on this forum. It is nothing more than a blatant advertisement for Miss Gillard.
How he could have the hide to write such campaign drivel is beyond me. He is careful to promote Miss Gillard whilst satisfying both sides of the population debate. Clearly he does not want to make any commitment that would upset the Labor immigrant vote. You know - that perpetual "gratitude vote" that Labor increasingly needs to retain power. (To put it more accurately - Union Power).
Thomson should tell us how he and Miss Gillard intend to stop the illegal boats - now. Not next month, next year or never. Now.
The routine collection of forced illegal entrants to our shores by the Australian navy should be stopped now, before the election, so we get real evidence of Miss Gillard's desire to reflect the wishes of the Australian people.
The illegal boats (another yesterday carrying 96 more potential Centrelink recipients) were going to end Kevin Rudd's career, and if Miss Gillard doesn't stop them, they will end hers. And that's not forgetting the four Australians who died from the insulation debacle and the thousands who now live in fear under Labor Government-funded electrically charged ceilings.
We are sick and tired of seeing Australians, many of them mentally ill, sleeping in cardboard boxes, on wet lawns and without the basic living necessities, while illegals are being kept warm, well fed and spending money in their pockets either in Queensland motels or in comfortable taxpayer funded public housing.
While the polls are saying one thing, all the people I speak to are saying something entirely different.
Comments
No kangaroos in the wild
A few years ago I went on a short coach trip from Melbourne, via South Australia, to Central Australia and Uluru and back. The coach had so anti-roo attachment, but we didn't see ONE KANGAROO the whole time! Not one! There were a few wild emus seen in the distance, but no kangaroos or wallabies. International tourists would be very puzzled, I am sure, and disappointed. This is Australia, and our wildlife are being annihilated by commercial forces and kangaroo-hating land-owners.
Why can Australians make themselves heard, while Canadians not?
This is brilliant news. The question that vexes me is, why have Australians been able to exert their will upon their federal government in this matter whilst Canadians have not? What is it about Australian political culture that makes for a much more assertive electorate? An electorate that despite the constraints of corrupted and dictatorial representative "democracy" and a growthist media have nonetheless forced a once popular Prime Minister from office?
Perhaps we should hire Australian consultants and media experts to coach us, much in the way that national soccer teams like England or Greece hire foreign coaches to lead their teams to victory. There is a popular bumper sticker in Canada that reads, "The more people I meet, the more I like my dog". Well, the longer I live in this country of Canada, the greener foreign pastures look. Canada would be a great nation, if it were not for Canadians. The flip side to our polite reserve and tolerance is the meek acceptance of every imposition from government and industry alike.
Our national culture seems permeated by a desperate need to avoid conflict by unreasonable self-flagellent accommodations. The irony is, by smothering debate to preserve a superficial civic truce, the pressure for a wrenching rupture builds up. Manufacturing consent and stifling dissent is a proven recipe for civil war. Even in Canada. How far down the road to overshoot will this happen? Probably much too late.
Tim
Kangaroo kicks woman checking fence
My friend, you let the cat out of the bag. Had your wife not had three dogs running loose on the kangaroo's territory (sorry, I realise you think it's your territory but the kangaroo was here first), I'm 100% certain the kangaroo would not have attacked. He did so because he was afraid of the dogs. In every case of a human being attacked by a kangaroo that I have heard of there was at least one dog off leash nearby. When will people learn to control their dogs? Dogs kill so many kangaroos either directly or by stress myopathy after being chased. I have seen it first hand so I do know what I am talking about. He was only trying to protect his family who would have been nearby. Put yourself in his shoes for a change instead of looking at kangaroos as if they are monsters. They are not. WE ARE!
"It’s embarrassing for Australia that we eat our own wildlife ....I’m here to tell you it’s just not right. Simply do not buy, use or eat kangaroo products”
~ Steve Irwin
Sign the most important petition ever created to help kangar
Harder to see kangaroos in the wild these days
From a friend Pam: Today I caught up with some old friends from Healesville Victoria who were up here on the Sunshine Coast Qld on holiday. They do a lot of travelling and said they had recently travelled from Tocumwal to Bourke to Charleville and did not see a single kangaroo on the way.
"It’s embarrassing for Australia that we eat our own wildlife ....I’m here to tell you it’s just not right. Simply do not buy, use or eat kangaroo products”
~ Steve Irwin
Sign the most important petition ever created to help kangar
Logging around Healesville unbearable unsustainable awful
Ed. From a report by Vicki L-S.
There was a public meeting at a small township called Healesville, in the Yarra Valley, Vic. last Thursday night regarding all the logging that is going on in and around Healesville. There are many mountains to the north and east of this town that incorporate other small communties and these mountains areas are being logged so heavily.
So many logging trucks travel night and day up and down our two nearby highways at great speeds and will stop for nothing! There were around 300 protesters at this meeting and everyone felt totally helpless, as no solutions were reached and the main speaker leading the anti logging group only allowed two people to speak, which was absolutely useless. The spokesperson for the logging company, of which I don’t know the name of, said that even though the logging is being carried out so extensively, both night and day, the company is still running at a loss! Nobody at the meeting could understand why this logging will then continue!
It is not the burnt trees being cut down after the recent bushfires, it is 200 - 300 year old trees being torn down, along with Black Boys, Tree Ferns and all the rest of the growth that you find in well developed forests. I was told that there is a google site called 'Near Earth' that gives an arial view of areas and you can return to the same area after a weeks time, to see the heavy logging devsstation to that same area, just after one week! SO TRAGIC ISN'T IT!!!
The logs are being turned into wood chips and sent over to China. All the people at this meeting are passionate about their environment, but feel helpless, as nobody is listening! Typically the orders to continue this logging must come from the state government, not the local. The local members of parliament werent even present at this meeting! Only one person from the media was there and they remained very quiet. They were from a local newspaper group!
HABITAT, ECO SYSTEMS, TREES, BIRDS, ANIMALS AND INSECTS ARE ALL SUFFERING GREATLY FROM THIS DEVESTATION, BUT THE PERPETRATORS NEVER STOP TO THINK OF THE BIG PICTURE DO THEY! AFTER IT HAS ALL GONE, WHAT THEN? WHAT THEN FOR US TO?
OH, YES, THEN EVERYONE WILL SAY, THE USUAL, "KANGAROOS ARE IN PLAGUE PROPORTIONS"!!!! BUT THESE IDIOTS WONT REALISE THAT THEY THE KANGAS AREN'T IN PLAGUE PROPORTIONS AT ALL, ITS JUST THEIR HOMES HAVE BEEN DESECRATED AND THEY HAVE HAD TO MOVE ON, !!! OH AND THEN THEY WILL BE CULLED!
THERE SEEMS TO BE NO END DOES THERE!
Unless of course ... Gillard and Democracy
Unless, of course, this was a true win for democracy, with Rudd booted out for his totally undemocratic service to big business and Gillard brought in by a disgusted parliament or one bowing finally to backbench pressure. I often wonder what Kelvin Thomson's role might really be.
I must say that to take this coup on face value - as representative of democracy - goes against my experience of recent Australian politics and I know that the mainstream press aren't going to like it. Since they run the country, either they were really taken by surprise or this move is byzantine beyond byzantine ... or have I missed something? I am open to more information. As some of you know James and I have been unavoidably disengaged from journalism due to unexpected and severe illness over past 5 or 6 weeks. We hope to return bit by bit to full engagement. Ironic that we were so busy on other things just as this storm was gathering then blew.
Sheila Newman, population sociologist
home page
Realistic kangaroo control
in response to anonymous (21 June) I would suggest that anyone that studies kangaroos using real study or real science is aware of the fact that kangaroo numbers have been proven to be controlled by the presence or absence of vegetation. I do not see any reason why the ACT grassland kangaroos should be an exception to this rule even though you claim this to be so. You can give them all the water in the world but it won't make an iota of difference if they haven't got any food. Many studies have demonstrated this.
More recent studies have also demonstrated that perceived high kangaroo numbers on areas that have been used previously for commercial grazing (sometimes for centuries), such as the ACT grasslands in question have very little to do with hampering the regeneration of the ecosystem. It goes without saying that kangaroos would have inhabited these areas in very high numbers before we degraded the land to the state we see now.
Shooting kangaroos to achieve a density that is deemed appropriate is simply guess work. If biodiversity is the main aim here then ACT kangaroo management should seriously consider re-introducing dingoes. This would control the numbers of kangaroos naturally and increase the level of biodiversity in the area. Many studies have demonstrated that dingoes are a key factor in controlling smaller predators such as cats and foxes, they are also fond of rabbits. Survival of small native mammals such as bettongs increase significantly in the presence of dingoes as do other small animals such as ground dwelling birds. Despite these findings ACT kangaroo management insist on short sighted kangaroo culls in "seeking successful ecological management outcomes". How realistic is that?
Julia for real on population sanity
Whoo! Maybe I will have to willingly eat my words, if the news about Julia Gillard being sane on population numbers actually turns out to be true. I have just received a press release which I will put up now on page 1.
If Julia brings back democracy to this country, I will call her Saint Julia, not a 'Yes-man', but a real woman.
Can this be happening... is parliament rising up against the growth lobby?
More on front page soon.
Sheila Newman, population sociologist
home page
Copyright to the author. Please contact sheila [AT] candobetter org or the editor if you wish to make substantial reproduction or republish.
Authoritative power is not legitimate power
Labor caucus is an internal political party process outside the legitimacy of the public view or say. Political appointments manifested as factional selection, pre-selection and branch stacking suit the agenda of party politics. It is illegitimate autocratic process and by definition undemocratic. It must be challenged.
Those who did not vote Labor are being excluded from the process.
Out of government, political parties may legitimately play politics as they wish since they only represent their own interests. But once in government and representing the people, such scope to play with power is relinquished in the process we call in Australia, 'representative democracy'.
Compare China's oppressive junta, where its Politburo appoints its chairman, president and officials all the way down the chain of socio-political power. Public representation is denied.
Australia is trumpeted as a representative democracy. So when the current leader of Australia and of the State of New South Wales are not elected (as is the current situation) their appointment is democratically illegitimate. The people have had no say in their current power appointment. Their respective appointments hold no credibility. The public perception quite rightly is that their appointment has been made by powerful unaccountable internal faction power brokers, not dissimilar to the autocratic political process of Australia's juntas to its north. When internal power is dispensed and financially supported by nameless lobbyists, how different is such political power to many Asian countries rife with corruption such as China, Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand?
Philosopher Herbert Spencer's [1820-1903] axiom "survival of the fittest" implies 'only the fittest organisms will prevail'. Such 'Social Darwinism' logic perpetuates might is right and that uncontrolled leads to violence and war.
More sustainable and relevant to 21st Century government is William Hamilton's [1936-2000] axiom of 'social evolution'.
What we saw executed by Labor caucus with Rudd's ousting was selfish behaviour benefiting the Right and its chances to re-election. A superior level of such social evolution would have been to have sought a mutually beneficial process and outcome - that which increased the fitness of the leadership without decreasing the rights of the electorate. The ousting ought to an publicly acceptable timeframe - say within two months.
How is the ousting of an elected leader any different to the ousting of Thailand's elected Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra in 2006 or the denial of power to Zimbabwe's elected Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangira in 2008?
The 'nature of politics' can be as any powerful regime deems it to be. Authoritative power is not legitimate power until the people, not political factions decide.
I wouldn't worry about it too much Paul
I wouldn't worry about it too much Paul. There are plenty of other football boot manufacturers who are lining up to use our national symbol to grace the feet of the world's soccer stars. The "ratbags" such as myself that you refer to have a long way to go in raising the awareness to others of the kangaroo's plight. I still find it amazing that so many people still believe that kangaroos are farmed for the expressed purpose of being turned into sporting goods or feeding dogs and cats. Even more amazing is the ignorance shown by those believing it a forgone conclusion that kangaroos must be shot whether their carcass is utilised or not. They do have a right to exist you know and as Australians we should be ashamed that the current population of kangaroos in places like Western Queensland are almost devoid of not only alpha males, but large kangaroos of either sex.
Backward cultures breaching Australian values should be outlawed
Re: 'funnelweb bill' comment above:
The self-righteousness of an imported culture to impose its lore upon Australian society has as much validity as military invasion. Our country our rules!
The concepts of 'cultural relativism' and 'multiculturalism' is about deculturation of the incumbent culture by imported cultures that disrespect local rights, reject assimilation and instead selfishly seek to impose an imported culture on the local population. In Australia it started with the British asserting 'terra nulius' and annihilating Aboriginal custodians. It exacerbated with post war immigration and it has evolved to the point where migrant decendants now have the balance of power to legislate immigrant cultures with more rights than the local culture.
The metaphoric multi-cultural soup or melting pot is a myth. What we have in reality is Spanish tapas - distinctly unrelated cultures each demanding their own rights and wriggle room. The cumulative effect over subsequent generations is not intermarriage, not acceptance of the dominant culture, but incompatible cultures undermining social cohesion and Australian values, building ex-patriot ghettos.
Backward cultures like Chinese Traditional Medicine (TCM) which advocate using rare wildlife body parts for so-called medicinal remedies are anathema to Australian social moral vaues and have no place in Australian modern civilized culture.
Of course this raises the obvious grey issue of what in fact are Australian core social values and whether these should be standardised and legislated?
If TCM in Australia abandoned the animal parts aspect of its practices, then it would deserve merit. But it doesn't. TCM condones illegal trading in wildlife parts like shark fin, tiger penis and bear spleen.
TCM has the same base values as traditional Solomon Island culture that advocates cannibalism and head-hunting. Permit one backward culture that is anathema to Australian cultural values and you set a precedent.
Backward cultures breaching Australian values should be outlawed.
And leave the bloody ostriches alone too!
Tiger Quoll
Snowy River 3885
Australia
Cassowarys heading towards the same fate as koalas
Despite this year being the UN Year of Biodiversity, the decline in koala populations means that they could be extinct in South-east Queensland within the next 20 years. Anna Bligh's government has stood by and watched the koala population of South-east Queensland dwindle as they continue to promote developments and population growth. Now the cassowaries are heading for the same fate!
The southern cassowary belongs to an ancient group of flightless birds that includes Australia's emu, Africa's ostrich and New Zealand's kiwi and now-extinct moa. With only 1000 left in the wild, they depend on habitat restoration and protection from urbanisation and introduced animals. Their best hope is to see some action from Environment Minister Peter Garrett by buying back land designated for housing in the Daintree, north of Cairns, and at Mission Beach to the south. However, the power of the growth lobby is formidable.
There are 23 birds, 4 frogs, and 27 mammal species known to have become extinct since European settlement of Australia. Extinctions are part of evolution, but humans are driving animals and plants to extinction faster than new species can evolve.
The "Nothing like Australia" tourist slogan could become obsolete when our iconic wildlife species are driven to extinction.
overpopulation
Running out of resources vital for life on Earth is not evidence of overpopulation; it's the beginning of depopulation. Overpopulation was our problem fifty years ago when we knew a solution and had a choice. Depopulation is the rotten fruit of unwarranted macho pride.
"It's up to God," say too many people.
Rudd's 2020 summit was a farce
John Marlowe wrote: "Rudd' experiment with autocracy should be learnt from. He started off with a progressive approach to listening to the electorate in his 2020 Summit."
Are you joking, John? Rudd listened to the growth lobby and appointed media-manufactured authorities to his so-called 'Summit', where they cemented their nonsense about a big population. There was nothing democratic or progressive about that summit. It was an absurd farce.
Sheila Newman, population sociologist
home page
About Nike
What a shame, just because a few ratbags jump up and down in the name of Kangaroos.
The roos will still be shot and the leather left to rot on the ground just so someone can feel "good" about the decision not to use that product.
Just a marketing stratagy thats all.
This website needs to
This website needs to include what krill harvesting actually is......
Realism please.
The comment of Anonymous (21st June) presents more fact of relevance and reason than the original article by Menkit Prince.
Anon says “….the anti-culling hysteria is badly informed and very damaging.” and I agree.
I could only guess if the view put forth by Prince is badly informed or just poorly presented perhaps even both, but it is undoubtedly hysterical and to a substantial degree nonsensical.
I agree wholly with Prince that the greatest threat to our ecology is human impact but so much of her article lacks merit right down to the fluff of the juvenile cartoons.
As merely one example, the 2006 SOE report ( quite erroneously) expresses that Kangaroos exert a grazing pressure of only 1-8% substantially less than that of sheep and cattle and Prince seeks to use this to justify her no cull never kill viewpoint.
The SOE figures merely represent a comparison of national populations. True grazing pressures can only be assessed with relevance in a local context. Thus the SOE figures have no relevance at all in judging the need to cull or not in a confined area such as the Canberra Nature Park represents. I suspect that Prince may lack understanding of what a grazing pressure actually represents.
Prince is entitled to her vegan viewpoint and desire to see an end to livestock farming (no matter how fanciful) but her suggestion that farmers have kangaroo proof fencing to protect crops is directly contradicting to her own view of live and let live and exposes the hypocritical nature of her fanciful warped utopian view. No less in measure than the accusations of hypocrisy she levels at ACT kangaroo management.
Displays of nonsensical hysteria and distortion of fact is less than helpful in seeking successful ecological management outcomes.
You are kidding.
I think you need to revisit this article, you clearly have no idea of the relationship between education and reduction in fire outbreak, this is proven and evidence is available from most forward moving societies. You seem to be intelligent but you speak utter nonsense.
Nike phasing out kangaroo leather
In response to a recent article published in the UK's "Daily Mail", Nike have announced they are phasing out the use of kangaroo leather in their products. It would appear that many people are still unaware that kangaroo leather is used in the manufacturing of soccer cleats by companies such as adidas, Puma and Nike let alone the inherent cruelty involved in obtaining kangaroo skins.
Evolution
Surely caucus being able to elect a new leader at a perceive failure of the present leader just like evolution? Survival of the fittest. This ultimately allows flexibility and success to the "fittest"! It is all about adapting and trade-offs with other forces. It's the nature of politics.
Actual-Number Representation and CIR needed
May I suggest that you read my article "Increasing Democracy in Australia: A Plan to Introduce Far Greater Democracy into our Current System of Parliamentary Representation" at http://www.destinymagazine.info/contents/02guilddemocracy.htm
This looks at some of the inequalities in our current system of democracy, and proposes a new system of Actual-Number Representation with Optional List Voting (ANROLV) combined with Citizens' Initiated Referendums to help remedy the situation.
Julia simply the next yes-man
Unfortunately I think that Julia is just the next yes-man. A bit like changing directors of Telstra in order to confuse the investors. Kevin has followed orders by moving on and Julia will be introduced as a 'new broom' but what will happen is that she will market or shove down our throats exactly what they thought Kev was too on the nose to keep selling. The miners and Mr Murdoch and friends will market Julia favorably as long as she does their bidding. She will be allowed to appear to get away with a little bit, but then she will have to follow orders.
It seems to me that premiers and prime ministers are now simple employees of the corporate sector. They do not have to be particularly intelligent and it is better if they do not understand or care about the consequences of the policies they market.
I suppose that someone might hope to get a premier or prime minister who was actually able to play the corporate sector at its own game - maybe as some think Bob Carr did - although James Sinnamon would disagree that he actually did so. However, the trends for democracy and quality of life to deteriorate as costs go up in response to politically engineered growth in demand through imposed population growth, runs against this hope.
Kevin, by the way, along with Wayne Swan, were involved from the first in the creation of Labor Resources and Labor Holdings, involving massive investments in the corporate and land-'producing' and property development sectors. We cannot hope for justice or decent standards or democracy from people who only understand dollars.
Sheila Newman, population sociologist
home page
Senator Bill Heffernan's warnings to the Senate
According to the UN, the world must produce 70% more food to feed the population by 2050! This unlikely to happen, and thanks to the policies of our Rudd government, Australia's ability to provide food for ourselves and export markets could be damaged.
Senator Bill Heffernan, Food Security SPEECH
Wednesday, 16 June 2010
According to the science—all science has vagaries though—50 per cent of the world’s population could be poor for water; one billion people could be unable to feed themselves; 30 per cent of the productive land in Asia, where two thirds of the world’s population will live, could be out of production due to urbanisation and climate change.
China is through the denial phase. By 2050 they will have 400 million people living off the Great Northern Aquifer, which is being irretrievably mined..... China and India are going into some of the poorer countries and buying some of the better agricultural land—not to feed the poorer countries but to export the production from that land back to their countries to feed themselves.
Fair enough, but We need to know who owns our agricultural land. China will have the capacity to feed only one-third of its population by 2070, so obviously they will be on the march around the world.
It should not be at the expense of our own food security!
This is not about farmers getting the best price for their land, which is the opposite argument being put by people who doubt the wisdom of protecting our
sovereignty through controlling and having knowledge of who is acquiring our agricultural resources.
Our own Murray Darling food bowl is already compromised and damaged by drought and over allocation of water for unsustainable farming.
If the science on Australia’s weather is 40 per cent correct then we will absolutely have to reconfigure the way we have settled and the way we do our business in regional and rural Australia.
To put that into context, at the present time, as Senator Faulkner would know, there is about $1.8 trillion being spent annually on defence around the globe. So we are all worrying about defence but not about how we are going to feed ourselves.
Exactly, why buy 100 F-35 Joint Strike Fighters at $60 million each when the potential enemy is already a large property owner of Australian production land?
This is a serious issue for Australia. I would like to put it firmly on the radar and get ordinary Australians to think about this.
Well said Mr Heffernan!
Congratulations to Julia Gillard
Congratulations to Julia Gillard, and let's hope there is a fresh new start for Australia, for the benefit of Australians. Kevin Rudd was under the control of big businesses, global mass markets and the finance industries. He betrayed Australia's interests by not supporting agriculture, allowing free trade to destroy our own industries, causing housing affordability to crumble, promoting population growth, and failed to protect whales from Japan's illegal harpoons.
The "greatest moral challenge of our time" became a farce by trying to address climate change and at the same time promote increasing greenhouse gas emissions.
Let's hope Julia Gillard proves to be a patriot and makes policies for the people of Australia and Australians instead of the diluted leadership we have been suffering from.
Population and climate change forum in Geelong Victoria-notice
A Public Forum on
Population Growth and
Climate Change
Saturday July 3rd
4pm to 6.30pm
Surfworld Sport and Rec Centre
Torquay
Amidst all the political debate in Australia, population growth has become inextricably
linked to economic growth and our future prosperity.
If the climate change problem is going to be addressed successfully, the global population
growth rate cannot be ignored.
How necessary is population growth?
Is growing the Australian population sustainable?
Kelvin Thomson MP, Member for Wills
Mr Thomson has in recent months spoken in Parliament and in public
about his desire to put the brakes on Australia’s - and the planet’s -
population growth rate. His 14 point plan provides concrete details on
how this could be achieved.
Mark O'Connor
Author of 17 books, including This Tired Brown Land, a study of
sustainability, population, and ecology in Australia, and Co-author of
Overloading Australia: How governments and media dither and deny on
population. Many ABC talks, including six on Ockhams Razor.
Dr. Bob Birrell
Bob is the director of the Centre for Population and Urban Research at
Monash University in Melbourne. He is one of Australia's leading social
scientists. Bob is joint editor with Katharine Betts of the quarterly
demographic journal People and Place published by CPUR.
www.sceg.org.au
__._,_.___
Canberra's kangacide
Anonymous's reasoning is ridiculous. As he/she says themselves, it's the ecology that determines the balance of species. If members of a dominant species are killed, it just encourages them to breed back up to fill the void. Kangaroos don't eat plant roots, their soft feet don't damage soils, rather their motion creates small depressions for seeds to fall into to germinate and their waste uniquely fertilises the soils. We need them to help regenerate degraded and overgrazed land. Kangaroos are beneficial and necessary for Australia's ecological biodiversity. It is not the presence of kangaroos that threatens our other native species, it is a lack of wildlife corridors, land clearing, introduced plants and animals and pseudo scientists that think they know better than nature. At the rate we are going we will lose all our native plants and animals, including kangaroos. Look at what Australia has already done to its koala populations. Let's not keep repeating the mistakes of the past we have already lost more of our native species than anywhere else in the world. It might be worth Anonymous taking a look at the Belconnen naval station site where over 500 kangaroos and their babies were brutally herded and killed to ensure the survival of native plants, insects and reptiles in 2008, to see how the current kangacide system works!!
Evict unsustainable farmers
Anyone who likens wildlife to ferals is one-eyed and disrespectful of nature,and probably a feral descendant themselves. Anyone who kills wildlife deserves to live an urban environment where they are not exposed to wildlife - just like dangerous criminals are kept away from ordinary society for society's own protection.
Those who constrain wildlife, forcing then to exist in a restricted unsustainable manner are cruel, invasive and disrespectful of the natural ecology and it is time such ecological vandals and errant poachers were outlawed as criminals.
As for the excessive numbers, start with humans. Ban immigration, implement a two child policy, prohibit new dams - 'the presence of water that is not available naturally will limit human breeding' and population.
Test farms for viability and triple bottom line sustainability and if they fail remedial testing, evict them back to the big smoke. Use rural land profitably and sustainably, or lose it to National Park!
Pen humans in urban enclaves since there is a significant over-representation causing the local ecology to be degraded enormously. This way Australia can sustain the wildlife, stem the tide of extinctions, plus sustain indigenous Australians and a restricted number of introduced human ferals.
It is in essence very simple and a better idea.
As for so-called 'scientists' recommending killing wildlife, name one that is a native zoologist and not paid for doctored reporting?
Tiger Quoll
Snowy River 3885
Australia
Kangaroo "culling" response
This argument is so logically off base and critically unexamined that I almost didn't respond. However, I believe "Anonymous" might benefit by examining two key issues.
First, he begins by stating that kangaroo lack natural predators and then uses humans as an example. Humans are the ultimate predator, and our global negative impact continues to grow in scale and scope beyond any historical record. In regard to kangaroos here in Australia, we commercially kill millions of them every year, recreationally and privately shoot them, smash them all over the roads with cars and trucks, and take away their homes, food, and genetic diversity by making their world "islands" of nature between developed and cleared land.
Second, he fails to mention that the reason the 'original ecology' doesn't exist is because European land management is particularly harmful in Australia. Low fertility, ancient land with little topsoil that has been cleared, overgrazed, polluted, and has had natural waterways and watersheds destroyed isn't going to support much life. There are ways to begin to heal the land and watercourses if that is the intent, but killing kangaroos isn't one of them.
~Robyn Cooper
Permaculturalist, Social Ecologist
Keep an eye out for who is
Keep an eye out for who is sniffing around the land being sold after the collapse of MIS schemes.
"There is about 269,000 ha of freehold forestry land on the Great Southern Forestry blue gum estate."
http://www.smh.com.au/business/blue-gum-properties-hit-the-block-2010061...
"THE final play in the $900 million Timbercorp collapse is about to be made with plans under way to sell a vast tract of land that spans the Victorian and South Australian borders.
A total of 30 plantation properties covering 11,000 hectares including 3556ha in south-west Victoria and 6985ha in south-east South Australia are being advertised for sale by tender. It is expected they will sell for between $35 million and $40m. "
http://www.standard.net.au/news/local/news/general/plantations-up-for-sale/1842490.aspx
"Last week, Landmark listed an 11,000ha parcel of blue gums for sale and interest is likely to come from forestry and broadacre agriculture."
I suppose local farmers will have $30-40 mil lying around?
Pen-pushiing desk-bound public servants
The desk-bound pen-pushing public servants in Canberra probably have never seen the grassland earless dragon, golden sun moth, striped legless lizard, pergunda grasshopper, or threatened plants such as the button wrinklewort. They wouldn't even know any of them if they fell over them! These environmental extremists, armchair conservations, are making policies based on paid ecologists' reports to meet their own ends. The farmers and land holders are such a powerful lobby that any impediment, such as kangaroos, must be got rid of or they lose votes! Anything native or indigenous about Australia is being eradicated, and purged.
Instead of being the "bush" Capital, Canberra is the heart of native animal mass slaughters and an anti-Australian drive. Anything belonging to our history, indigenous people, Colonial heritage, or uniquely Australian such as wildlife and wilderness areas are a reminder of Australia that was! Now we are global citizens, a resource in the southern area of the Asia Pacific region. Kangaroos should only be a symbolic presence, not real animals that are actually part of our biodiversity. It is more convenient to "greenwash" their slaughter as if are not contrary to their environment's integrity.
Kangaroo culling
I despair when I read this kind of discussion by intelligent people. While I agree 100% with your points about the reductions of size and effectiveness of nature parks by encroaching suburbs, the anti-culling hysteria is badly informed and very damaging.
ANYONE who studies -- real study, actual science -- of local ecologies agrees with the need to cull roos (and rabbits). The reasons are very simple:
- the density of roos in these constrained places is way higher than occured naturally.
- the reason for this is partly lack of predators (humans and dingos) and other issues, but mainly the presence of water that was not available naturally. The dams that still exist in these reserves provide drinking water that allows roos to breed to levels limited by vegetation where otherwise they bred limited by water.
- this significant overrepresentation of roos means that the local ecology is degraded enormously as grass is unable to set seed, lack of green/brown stuff means erosion and soil dynamics change, and the normal ecology of these grasslands disappears. (together with lack of small mammals and other animals that used to live here but have entirely disappeared. Apparently these animals had an important role in soil turnover etc and we need to get them back too).
- without the original ecology, other species are unable to survive. It is these species that land managers are trying to protect, and that people interested in animals should be concerned with. It is in essence very simple and it's unforgivable that supposedly intelligent and compassionate people are allowing these species to die/disappear.
Just ask yourself why the government and scientists decide they need to cull. Why would anyone do something that causes such ructions unless it was really necessary? It's not a 'hate roos' mentality, it's a 'save ALL the animals and plants" outlook. Really it's time people like you got aligned with science, compassion and real life and made an effort to understand what was going on, and then support necessary culling.
Unless you have a better idea for saving these entire ecologies and the smaller, not necessarily fury animals and plants that belong there?
Australia is not southern China
Australia is not southern China.
Since when did the Australian Constitution allow for Australian resources, real estate, natural environment, corporate capital and government policy to be controlled and influenced by a foreign state like China?
Chairman Rudd is a traitor to Australian sovereignty and Australian values.
He commits more of Australia's wealth to foreign states and their immigrants than to Australia and its indigenous and natives.
Religions are unethical when the religious leaders are
Re: comment above ' that is quite a statement...' by Anonymous 18th June 2010.
In reply:
A religious group is unethical when the leaders of that group 'go about doing stuff' that is unethical.
The religion is only as humanly valuable and valid as an honest faith as the ethics of its leaders.
Update on Planning Amendment VC 67 protest
Protectors of Public Lands Victoria Inc.
MEDIA RELEASE 21 JUNE 2010
COMMUNITY PROTEST OVER MINISTER’S PLANS TO TRASH MELBOURNE
In order to action his planning blueprint for “Melbourne @5 million” Premier Brumby has to find land for another 284, 000 new homes in the next 20 years to cope with the Government generated population boom. [Candobetter.org Ed. Strange choice of words. This is not a'boom'; it is a disaster.] The State Government is determined to extend the Urban Growth Boundary to facilitate rezoning vast areas of rural land as residential and with this end in mind proposes to amend the Melbourne Planning Scheme. Planning Minister Madden has refused to look at vacant land or brown field sites within the existing UGB. Additionally he has refused to adopt any measures to deter developers from “land banking.” He has broken the promises made by former Premier Bracks that the UGB would never be changed nor would Green Wedges be alienated or touched.
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Three major community organisations – Protectors of Public Lands Victoria Inc, Green Wedges Coalition Inc and Planning Backlash are holding a protest at 1 pm on Tuesday 22 June 2010 on the steps of Parliament to declare opposition to Planning Amendment VC 67, which Planning Minister Madden proposes to put to the Upper House tomorrow Tuesday for ratification. There is a major community revolt over extension of the Urban Growth Boundary which will signify growth of urban sprawl, destruction of Green Wedges and decimation of arable food producing land. Plus there is community fury over the well hidden, previously unpublicised provisions of Clause 12 of the Planning Amendment. These spell high rise residential development along tram, bus and light rail transport corridors plus around train stations and the go-ahead for the E6 freeway reservation. These will change the face of Melbourne forever and destroy our rural surrounds. The rally will ask the Greens, Coalition and DLP member to vote “no” to VC 67.
Brian Walters SC, President of PPL VIC, comments: “We vigorously oppose the move by the Brumby Government to ratify VC67 which will create growth areas on the fringe of Melbourne outside the existing boundaries, thus extending and creating urban sprawl. It will alienate established Green Wedges; destroy the environment and wildlife; result in loss of biodiversity; and loss of arable land for food production. This will inevitably increase car dependency; worsen Victoria’s greenhouse gas emissions and contribute to climate change with land clearance, unsustainable housing and reliance on road transport. We remain firm in our opposition to VC 67 Planning Amendment.”
Julianne Bell PPL VIC Secretary comments on VC 67: “Concealed in a clause in this planning amendment is provision to allow high rise residential development along tram, bus and light rail routes. This is a lunatic planning solution by the Brumby Government to accommodate Melbourne’s population boom. The ‘rack ‘em and stack ‘em’ strategy is a way of squeezing in another 1.5 million people by 2036. This will see the evolution of concrete corridors with heat islands, wind tunnel effects and put neighbourhoods at risk of flash flooding with impermeable street surfaces. Where are the open spaces and parks for rest and recreation as advocated in the Government’s much publicised “Healthy Parks Healthy People” doctrine? The Sunday Age has revealed serious health risks to people living 500 m within major roads, including asthma in children. Hence the Government will be putting at risk the health of a large section of the community.”
PPL VIC calls on Members in the Upper House to vote: “NO” to VC67 tomorrow.
Copyright notice: Reproduction of this material is encouraged as long as the source is acknowledged.
How about all you boat
Editorial comment: We understand that the author of the comment below is angry but we feel that we must point out that generalisation about the motives and characters of people arriving in boats is simply not fair on those people. More than this, it plays the government and opposition's own game, which is to deflect attention from the undemocratic huge legal immigration program that they both support, onto asylum seekers arriving by boat. We recognise that the system is unweildy and expensive but we also recognise that people who are persecuted must have some international outlet, and that we in Australia theoretically do as well, although in reality the international community is failing us terribly by classifying us as a rich democracy, when any activist knows that our country is being suffocated by the soft boot of corporate plutocracy and media spin.
Here is the original comment, published in the spirit of free speech:
How about all you boat people lovers have them move into YOUR homes, at YOUR cost! You can feed, clothe, shelter and provide their medical, at YOUR cost! Given you feel so strongly about making us all wear the financial burden of YOUR guilt I propose you can get all the atonement you want by YOU paying for it, eh.
Because I don't feel an ounce of guilt towards these cowards, often young Iraqi and Afghanistan men who fled their countries, when our bravest and best diggers are in their countries fighting for their freedom!
This is so so outrageous -
This is so so outrageous - that not only is the Government/was allowing 'foreign investment' or purchase of Aussie residences, but we're seeing now that of agricultural, land. We should be fuming! It is so against Australian farmers, of livestock and plant-based produce - to be selling farms to Asian buyers, so that they may keep produce they grow here, and then - sell it back to us in Australia!! What the...
"Asylum" Seekers.
Ellen, the signs of hope are there. With Penrith paving the way for the outcome of the Federal election, those of us who want Australia's borders protected may achieve what has so unjustly been denied.
I don't want to see Gillard as Australia's Prime Minister. Now or ever. She would be even further out of her depth than Rudd.
Our country has lost its character under Rudd/Gillard Labor - under our very noses we have been taken in directions that we did not expect. We do not have endless resources, our Centrelink benefit system cannot continue to absorb cost of assistance for long-term, self-invited reliant newcomers.
Rudd/Gillard Labor's arrogance in refusing to respond appropriately to the public's concerns about open borders is the major reason they will go. On top of all other things, what we are most concerned about is the preservation of Australian culture and the right to determine who comes here, and when.
My other hope is that Australia will not acquiesce to what now appears to be a passing affair with globalisation. I hope to see our beautiful country remain independent, to make our own decisions, and not be pressured or over-influenced by outfits like the United Nations.
What we have is unique. I just pray that we can stay wise.
Australia's finest, sacrificed by old men.
Malcolm Fraser - he is the man who sent young Australians to the Vietnam war - before they were even old enough to vote.
I remember well the five years of hell my family spent waiting to see if my brother's birthday marble would come out of that hated barrel. We worried night and day. He was and is a gentle soul, totally unsuited to fighting a civil war in a foreign land.
My mother's life was stolen for those years.
My brother missed the ballot but too many of those kids we knew weren't so lucky. And kids they were. Males are always a few years less mature than females of the same age. It was a very cruel time. It felt like their youth was plundered and I wished Malcolm Fraser and all the sycophants following his leadership would have fallen into a big black hole in the ground, suffocating in their own vomit.
My boyfriend was blown up in Vietnam. They used to crawl through tunnels where snakes and other deadly creatures were waiting for them. So many stories of jungle warfare. Kids - conscripted and ripped from their homes and families. Soon after learning how to stab a bayonet into a pretend "gook", they were shipped off to do the bidding of Malcolm Fraser's government. The old man from posh Nareen.
My regular army cousin told many stories. Some about soldiers taking the enemy up in helicopters and pushing them out at the point of a bayonet after they extracted the required information. My cousin died at a very young age.
Malcolm Fraser later reinvented himself as a "humanitarian". I feel sick.
I cannot look at Mr. Fraser. That self-righteous manner - and I ask myself, does this man feel no shame. How does he sleep at night. Now there have been other old men since then who have sent our fine young Aussies to die on foreign soil, but the difference is that Malcolm Fraser conscripted those youths before they were even eligible to vote. They were not volunteers.
It worries me greatly of late to see our servicemen returning to their homeland in caskets at the same time as televised pictures show hundreds of fit, healthy military-age men arriving on boats, fleeing the same destination that is going to damage the minds and bodies of our soldiers. Some of these newcomers are paying their way into Australia while our people of similar age are sacrificing their lives and those of their families. I feel as uncomfortable about these latest events as I did during those Vietnam war years.
I thought our military is supposed to be protecting our shores. I thought our government was training our soldiers to fend off any attack, to watch for and push back any enemy from our beaches, from our skies. It's called the Australian Defence Force.
I know that there have been times when our men and women have willingly stood up to evil, and for that we are eternally grateful, we never forget. The circumstances of all conflicts are different, but conflict is not always equal and every conflict is not everyone's responsibility.
Malcolm Fraser. I just wish he would have shown the grace to have left the public stage many, many years ago.
Heven is hell for RSPCA veterinarians
An RSPCA veterinarian died and went to heaven. She arrived at Pearly Gates and was greeted by Arch Angel Gabriel who was very hesitant and advised the Vet she would be better off going to the other place. This Vet was insisting she belonged in Heaven and claimed she had cared for many animals all her working life. Eventually Arch Angel Gabriel relented and with a deep sigh let the Vet in where upon the Vet was torn apart for eternity by all the dogs she had sent to Heaven.
Editorial comment: This comment appears to make a judgment against all veterinarians. We think that it may be unfair to judge all RSPCA veterinarians in this way. More substantiation is required. James Sinnamon
Anna Blithering Idiot.
Why doesnt Anna Bligh ..F -- K off back to the US of A or wherever it is IT came from....
wildlife "collateral damage" in Labor's great rush to purge
Already Anna Bligh's development-driven population growth rate is responsible for the deaths and demise of koalas and their habitats in Queensland. This Labor Government has dithered while the population of koalas in the South-East has declined by over 50% in only three years. Now, scores of threatened animal and plant species will be destroyed or have their habitats wiped out to clear the way for Queensland's unstoppable coal-seam gas industry.
Western Queensland and Curtis Island, off Gladstone, will be cleared by prospectors, workers and drilling crews in an effort to lay 1000 km of pipelines to Gladstone. Bird and animal habitats will be destroyed in the effort - "collateral damage" in the name of economic growth and "progress". A long list of birds and native animals officially classified as endangered, vulnerable or rare are in the path of well, and will have to go.
What about the Environmental Impact Statement? There are too many royalties at stake, too much money to be made, to care.
Premier Anna Bligh is welcoming the gas projects and there is little recognition of the dangers to native species. Koalas, frogs, owls and wallabies are merely collateral damage in Labor's great rush to purge its debt, incurred because of developer greed and Labor's quest for economic growth through population growth!
Federal and State Labor members do not care about the horrific slaughter of turtles and dugongs in Far North Queensland and have not lifted a finger in terms of their protection. Nothing highlights more than their inaction, Labor’s total disregard for protected species in Queensland.
Kangaroo..
May these useless Moronic Pen Pushers who probably know nothing about nature,the countryside rot in hell.I wonder if these Imbeciles in Canberra have children and if they do what kind of an example are they setting for the future generations..We as taxpayers are actually paying the salaries of these useless politicians such as Rudd and that Robot Gillard,to lead Australia down the path of no return...They will not be happy until the last kangaroo is wiped out.
Going back to the Asylum Seeker post...It doesnt really matter who is leading this country.It doesnt matter that Kevin Rudd will be knocked out next time round,because its already planned that way....You dont really think anything will change when the next Government moves in..It will just get worse..Politicians are all Puppets on strings,controlled from above by a bigger Monster..for their agenda..
What is the REAL reason for the planned massacres?
Kangaroo 'Management' is just white-man-double-speak for murdering Aussie kangaroo families and stomping baby kangaroos for
whatever stupid greedy reasons. Canberra bureaucrats are simply desk-bound killers with their own agendas.
They will massacre nearly 2000 "environmental" pests, native animals called kangaroos! The job will go to "experienced marksmen" and give them short-term employment, using these gentle native animals as targets.
The "cull" was endorsed by the RSPCA as part of the ACT Kangaroo "Management" plan.
Apparently there is an "over-abundance" of kangaroos in the nature reserves. It will be undertaken as part of an independent report on the lowland grasslands in the ACT.
"Independent" Maxine Cooper said Mt Painter was "barren" and would not recover unless the kangaroos were "managed".
Threatened native fauna include the grassland earless dragon, golden sun moth, striped legless lizard, pergunda grasshopper, and threatened plants such as the button wrinklewort. Apparently these "independent" reports ignore the irony that these threatened species are also Australian native animals, along with the kangaroos, and they are all part of the same ecosystems and have co-evolved together long before white-man needed to "manage" populations.
Animals are intrinsic to the overall functioning of grassy ecosystems. Animals are essential for pollination and dispersal of many grassland plants and are involved in nutrient recycling and maintenance of soil condition. Grasslands provide habitat for animals and are a source of food for both herbivores and predators.
Australian grasslands have evolved under grazing from a range of animals, including kangaroos, wallabies, wombats and other herbivores such as termites. The population sizes (or densities) of grazing animals are determined largely by seasonal abundance of the grassland plants upon which they feed. In turn, plant species composition and abundance of grassland vegetation are affected by the population size of grazers (grazing
intensity) and seasonal conditions (rainfall and temperature).
National Recovery Plan for Natural Temperate Grassland of the Southern Tablelands (NSW and ACT):
An Endangered Ecological Community, 2006
The numbers of kangaroos grazing is related to the abundance of food and seasonal conditions!
These are supposed to be Nature Parks! Safe places for nature? What example are we setting to children and society when instead they are places where people go to shoot kangaroos and bash their babies to death? No wonder this is such a bullying, aggressive, selfish society.
Remember the Googong Dam Kangaroo Massacre 2004? Officially it was to "protect the water supply..."
FOI showed the real reason was because farmers on surrounding properties wanted them killed. The kangaroos had escaped the paid killers, called 'professional shooters', shooting on the properties.
Likewise the Belconnen Kangaroo Massacre 2008, the Majura Range Kangaroo Massacres 2009 - the real reasons for these were not admitted at the time- was developers wanted the land!
Ironically, the Federal Greens have said it's "not their problem", and the ACT Greens support the killing kangaroos around Canberra. So much for Greens supporting "native animals and their habitats", as spelt out in their policy booklet!
The numbers to be culled have been based on kangaroo counts in each location. However, some people have visited one of the so-called "counts" where there are (claimed) 600 kangaroos negatively impacting through grazing, but they didn't even see 40, and there was hardly any roo poo in any of the paddocks!
There are some very imbalanced and distorted policies coming from Canberra, and either the over-heating in these public service buildings are giving these desk-bound "conservationist" mental confusion/delusions, or there are some native-animal hating-bureaucrats paying for "environmental" reports to endorse killings of native animals in an effort to sterilise the land for their self-serving ends.
Kangaroos..
Is the " TWO LEGGED MONSTER " ever going to leave these poor, gentle animals alone...What can be done to stop the Aussie who Drawls all over the Socceroo, respect their national icon that the REST of the world loves..How dare these Hypocrits name a useless soccer team after a beautiful native animal that they destroy and are determined to send to extinction...God help this country I despair.. I think the " TWO LEGGED MONSTER IS ON ITS LAST LEGS" and Im referring to the human parasite not the Kangaroo.
The ACT Government has just announced that areas within the Canberra Nature Park will be closed from 6 pm Saturday 19 June 2010 to 6 pm Saturday 31 July 2010 to allow for the controlled culling of over-abundant Eastern Grey Kangaroos. The sites to be closed are Callum Brae Nature Reserve, Crace Nature Reserve, Goorooyarroo Nature Reserve, Jerrabomberra West Nature Reserve, Kama Nature Reserve, Mount Painter Nature Reserve, Mulligan’s Flat Nature Reserve and unleased territory land adjacent to Kama Nature Reserve.
“The cull of up to 1890 kangaroos is needed to maintain kangaroo populations at appropriate levels to protect the integrity of ecosystems, several of which contain endangered flora and fauna,” said Director, Parks, Conservation and Lands, Russell Watkinson. “The numbers to be culled have been based on kangaroo counts in each location. “Ensuring the grasslands and woodlands are not overgrazed will protect threatened species and ecosystems, provide habitat for creatures such as ground-feeding birds, prevent excessive soil loss and maintain sustainable numbers of kangaroos.” Mr Watkinson said the kangaroos will be humanely culled by experienced marksmen. * ACT Media Release
We have a Chinese-Mandarin speaking MP helping China
THE Chinese Government is buying Australian farms to directly feed its population, a senior Liberal said on the eve of a visit by a top Bejing official.
The purchases are not monitored by the Foreign Investment Review Board, Senator Bill Heffernan told Parliament. Farm buy-ups were not referred to the FIRB unless they were worth more than $320 million! So, unless the farm property is under this amount, it just becomes "international" land! Just how many farms are worth more than this anyway? The produce from these farms would be sent to China to secure their food supply for the future.
For the first time in history we have a Chinese-Mandarin speaking Prime Minister more focused on helping China's growth and threatening food shortages than actually helping Australia! Farmers are also being forced to sell their land due to sky-rocketing rates to make land available for property developers.
Instead of buying 100 new JSF aircraft at A$70 million each, why don't we just surrender and become a province of China?
We seriously lack patriotism and vision in Australia and too easily selling out to the highest bidder - something we will regret!
that is quite a statement to
that is quite a statement to make really. I don't think particular religions are unethical but that the way people go about doing stuff based on their religion can affect they way people see a particular religion. However you can't blame the religion itself because of actions from other people.
Australia is the free-est and most liberal nation on the planet
In response to the two above comments,
1. 'Lack of fervour and patriotism for Australia' by Anonymous 12th June 2010,
2. 'Asylum Seekers' by RichB 13th June 2010.
Australia is the free-est and most liberal nation on the planet.
Alternative democracies like Britain and the United States don't come close.
But that is not to say we cannot learn from comparable democracies like Canada and Switzerland.
What Australians are slack about is recognising our special culture, values and living standards and then realising these are all under threat by privileged politicians living an aristocratic life and by wealthy newcomers from abroad demanding they import their preferred customs and lesser standards that are incompatible with Australian best practice.
Never give up on the hope of our great nation! Australia is without doubt world's best practice for humanity. This is not a biased comment. Test it and simply travel overseas!
Travel to Gundagai and witness first hand the many rural ordinary Australians from the bush that sacrificed everything for their country - tragic memorials survive in the traditional town of Gundagai from not just WWII, but WWI, and indeed from the Boer War.
These Australians fought for Australia to be a free and liberal nation not to be overrun by foreign cultures. My great uncle was 'killed in action' at Mont Brehain, France in October 1918, a month short of Armistice.
Australians need to stop being complacent!
Collusion with the State government
There is a clear collusion between the growth lobby and land sales inside dealings.
According to The Weekly Times, a West Australian property developer, Mr Simpson, made repeated offers before buying land later chosen as the site for a valuable transport hub north of Melbourne. "That property didn't come up for sale, they (the agents for Simpson) went in and asked for it," a source privy to the sale has claimed.
Mr Simpson initially offered $3 million for the 202-hectare parcel at Beveridge. When this was knocked back, successive bids rose over the next three months to $6 million, then $10 million, $12 million and finally $14.5 million.
Minister Tim Pallas, whose department selected the site for the logistics centre, a move that potentially lifted Mr Simpson's land value to more than $200 million.
Beveridge landholders, part of the new urban boundary, said at the time of the offer they had no idea their land had been earmarked for a freight terminal.
Australian Electoral Commission records show Mr Simpson has donated $85,000 to the Australian Labor Party's West Australian branch, with $45,000 donated in 2007-08 and 2008-09.
The State government are part of the growth lobby, and are members of the Property Council of Australia.
If this is not insider trading and collusion, what is?
Economists consider tearing down homes to protect housing market
Economists consider tearing down homes to protect housing market
By Elizabeth Razzi
Saturday, June 12, 2010
Douglas Duncan, vice president and chief economist for Fannie Mae, raised a provocative idea at a recent meeting of real estate journalists in Austin: Some of the misconceived housing developments built during the boom years might have to be torn down because they don't make financial sense.
Duncan agreed with Stan Humphries, chief economist at Zillow.com, who warned that a "tremendous shadow inventory" of homes is poised to come on the market. That includes future foreclosures (due to negative equity and continued high unemployment), homes that will end up in foreclosure after failed loan modifications, and homes from what he calls "sideline sellers" who have been biding their time until the housing market improves. Humphries said home prices won't bottom out until the third quarter of this year, leading to "the second phase of the housing recession": below-normal price appreciation for several years. (The long-term appreciation norm is 3 to 5 percent per year.)
Said Duncan: "Some of that shadow inventory could have to be torn down. It was not economically viable when it was put in place." That includes some boom-time developments in California's Inland Empire and Central Florida. Duncan said people might find that the cost of sustaining their lifestyle in some developments -- including high transportation costs to far-away jobs -- is greater than the cost of the home. That could wipe out demand.
Who would pay for tear-downs? What would happen to the people who have hung on to their homes despite the foreclosures all around them? All are unanswered questions.
Economists are discussing the idea, but Duncan said he doesn't know of any policymakers considering it. "It's un-American to think about tearing down housing," he said. "But we have a long history of ghost towns."
"Asylum" seekers.
To RichB -
You won't have to wait very long to see stricter border protection policies implemented. The Rudd outfit is going to be thrown out in an election rout like you have never seen. If it is closer than most expect, just pray that Gillard does not replace Rudd - her extreme left-wing ideals will INCREASE immigration. However, if you read the online newspaper comments, it's reasonably apparent that the Rudd-Gillard Labor government is finished.
What astounds me is that the incompetent Kitchen Cabinet (Rudd, Gillard, Tanner and Swan) ignored adverse public feedback on the issue of illegals forcing their way into our country until there has been so much damage there is no time to rectify it before the election. It is all too fresh in voter memories.
Why they have not learned any lessons from the UK open order experience is beyond most of us.
Victorian Auditor General's damning report
Irrigators are significant consumers of Victoria’s water. They use around 74 per cent of all the harvested water in Victoria.
Inefficiency means that only around one third of the water diverted into the irrigation channels and pipes does not reach the end users.
The report found that in effectiveness, efficiency and financially, the irrigation-related programs and the planning processes for the Foodbowl Modernisation Project failed to achieve their outcomes.
Victorian Government decision to invest around $2 billion in irrigation efficiency and related projects between 2004 and 2007 were poorly informed. Poor
documentation and record keeping has been a consistent concern in this audit and has inhibited The Department of Sustainability and Environment’s (DSE) ability to provide the necessary assurance on the status of the irrigation efficiency programs.
There was no evidence that any of the projects had undergone a robust assessment of the need to invest in asset solutions, rather than non-asset solutions, as the main way to increase irrigation efficiency or to secure Victoria’s water supplies. This was also the case for the Sugarloaf Pipeline. Analysis of costs and benefits was superficial and information to support the basis for water savings assumptions was lacking.
In some instances the costs of the projects exceeded the planned costs, expected water savings had not been achieved and the effectiveness of the modernisation was uncertain.
They have wasted millions of dollars in tax-payers' money. The opposition has accused Mr Brumby of deceiving Victorians over one of the state's most expensive infrastructure projects. Overall - a FAIL on the report card!
so ur saying that people
so ur saying that people will rent to homeless people that won't pay the rent?
Possum
You guys are crazy possums in nz need to die
Free Minerals for New Migrants
Underpinning debate on the Mining Super Profits Tax is the principle that: ALL AUSTRALIANS OWN EQUALLY ALL THE MINERALS BELOW THE EARTH.
I'm a 4th generation Aussie - no big deal. But one of my great-grandfathers came from a tin mine in Cornwall to the Gympie gold rush.
One grandfather worked on the railways. I myself once worked in the assay laboratory at Mt Isa Mines. My brother and his wife have worked as medicos in remote WA towns. In a way, I feel that over 130 years my family has "contributed" in some way to the mining industry and the infrastructure that supports it. We have earned our share of Australia's mineral wealth.
Why then does a new migrant, or a new refugee get given an equal share of all those present and future minerals?
After a few homeless years, I live in a South Melbourne community boarding house. The management has given the room next to mine to an overseas student. The 40-yr old tertiary educated Australian alchoholic who used to live in that room, is now on the streets. If SouthPort Housing starts to give rooms to Indian students, affordable inner-city housing will become even rarer than hens teeth. And us old Aussies will all be out on the streets.
Alpacas are protected in Peru- not our kangaroos
Alpacas in Peru are not used as beasts of burden, but mainly are valued for their fibre, and traditionally have been valued also for meat, hair, hides, and their dung, used as fuel. Today, it is illegal to slaughter or trade in alpaca meat in Peru. Because of the high price commanded by alpaca on the growing North American alpaca market, illegal Alpaca smuggling has become a growing problem.
Alpacas are worth more in Peru alive than dead! However, the same can not be said for our own wildlife. Ironically, Peruvians will be encouraged to buy and eat our kangaroos, but their iconic animals, symbols of their heritage, are protected!
Dalby hasn't the water supply for more people
The mayor of Dalby has given a less than enthusiastic response to news Canberra is considering his small Queensland town as a site to house asylum seekers. The federal government is seeking more mainland sites to house asylum seekers because Christmas Island is full. Last summer, the Mayor Ray Brown said the town was in real danger of running out of water and restrictions may be increased to their highest level if the situation doesn't improve.
Cr Brown said the weir is empty and the town's been drawing its water supply from bores.
Queensland towns of Dalby, Toowoomba and Maleny, running out of water Although there were ``some cowboys'' in the town, according to Cr Brown, by and large residents had been extremely frugal in how they had conserved water.
Recently there was the debate on population growth and the need for increased food production. The time comes when flooding some of the most productive farm land in Australia with more people is NOT good idea, and these asylum seekers, no matter how desperate and genuine, will not be given the "welcome mat"!
Australia is already stressed by our world-standard population growth, and adding asylum seekers will not improve our already maligned "racist" image.
Asylum Seekers.
I think its about time Australia woke up to what the useless Rudd Government is up to.This morning it was stated that 189 more Asylum Seekers were being moved to the mainland.Not long ago another load were moved from Christmas Island to the mainland,with the Government spouting that Christmas Island is full.Well if its full send them back.Personally I believe the Australian Government has a plan behind this,to flood Australia with Asylum Seekers,the same as the UK,USA etc.
There are alot of Australians struggling financially now,and their hard earned taxes are paying for all the Doctors,nurses,wide screen TV,s,playstations etc that are placed in these new Asylum Centres.And still the boats keep coming day after day.These Asylum Seekers will be harder to remove now that they are on the mainland..Oh thats strange isnt it?.But the Australian public continue to meander along like nothings wrong.Only concerned with who may win the Footy at the weekend or if the SoccerROOS,will win the world cup,or their huge mortgage dept.The Australian Government doesnt give a hoot about the Australian public and is ripping them off blind,but not a complaint or whisper from anyone.Wakeup Australia before its too late..What a bunch of hypocrits they name their soccer team after our beautiful national icon the Kangaoo,but they slaughter them in their thousands,and now they want to sell their meat to the Parasitical Chinese...What hope is there for this once great nation?
In a nutshell
Fantastic work, Vivienne!
You have summed up the problem in a nutshell.
The past was better than the present.
The future looks worse still.
The media and our politicians are mostly trying to sell us a pup just to get us to fork over our last dollars to their rich friends. That may not sound really technical coming from a sociologist, but that's how it really is.
Lack of fervour and patriotism for Australia
Our leaders, and so many of our "diverse" community, do not love Australia. Instead of serving the interests of Australians, and the long term interests of Australia, our governments are forcing globalisation onto us, and regional concerns.
Kevin Rudd is a symptom of lack of leadership and patriotism in Australia. This is the sad reality. He has helped the job situation in China with all their exports flooding Australian markets, and helped their economic growth through mining resources, and even helped their "skills shortages" by being able to access our educational institutions. As for climate change, our world-record level of greenhouse gas emissions is being boosted by all our coal reserves, and we are actually exporting climate change around the world!
Our workforce "solutions" should be about investing in Australians instead of outsourcing jobs and manufacturing overseas. We have "students" undercutting the wages and jobs of Australians. Instead of exporting our tertiary education institutions as degree factories, many local potential students are locked out of professions due to lack of course places or excessive HECS/HELP fees. Then more people are imported due to "skills shortages"!
'Protectionist' or indigenous and local rights?
Re: Vivienne's "Skills shortages" in Australia? comment above (10th June 2010):
In response:
You know anytime Australians call on our governments to consider the needs of those at home before those of foreign lands, Australians are labelled 'protectionist.' Such stereotyping has become a standard kneejerk one-liner response intended to silence dissent over what has become a 'migrants first' policy.
Yet take a look at the contrasting neglect by Australian governments of the first Australians. Many Aboriginal people across Australia in 2010 continue to subsist in in Third World poverty, have Third World infant mortality rates, have Third World life expectancies, and Third World hope. No wonder family breakdown and substance abuse is chronic in many Aboriginal communities.
And take a look at the contrasting neglect by Australian governments of rural Australians. Yes these are the Australians living beyond politicians short-sighted urban and coastal growth focus. Inland rural Australia has a litany of disadvantage. Rural hardship has been compounded by the vagaries of unpredictable weather and other environmental conditions (drought, floods and bushfire); weak commodity prices and deteriorating terms of trade (exacerbated by globalisation and 'free' trade policy); rising farm costs relative to farm prices resulting in declining farm incomes, putting pressure on farming families; and microeconomic reform and the withdrawal of services by both the private sector and governments from rural and remote communities with consequent unemployment.
But the big populations are in the cities, and the more people the more votes, so party politicians focus taxation spending and investment in the cities where the votes are - like wasteful billion dollar desalination plants, more urban motorways, and extravagant events to rival those of aristocratic days of yore. In this way politicians get to stay in office longer to qualify for that big parliamentary pension.
The bush is ignored by our urban-centric governments and so Australia is steadily becoming a class society of 'two nations' of wealthier cities turning their backs on a more impoverished bush.
Local and indigenous rights come naturally before the rights of new comers. First in first served! And I am not talking charity. I am talking real investment in housing, health, affordable living and education.
But Australian governments have been hijacked by increasingly powerful immigrant lobby groups that demand more rights and higher priority for new migrants. They claim they are minority groups and so more worthy.
Well my response is get in the queue! Indigenous have been neglected the longest. They come before newcomers.
So Labor's Immigration Minister Evans is labelling more unsustainable immigration as a 'reform'? But Australian immigration is at record levels. The only 'reform' would be to slow immigration and let Australia's capacity catch up!
So Labor's Immigration Minister Evans is justifying more immigration "designed to provide workforce solutions for the business community". This is a cheap bandaid to make the government's economic data look good. It is a defeatist approach to our own education system for government to claim that we cannot skill up Australians to suit Australian business needs, so therefore we invite in foreigners to take Australian jobs.
Such corrosive thinking is usurping indigenous and local Australians into an increasing under-educated poorer underclass, while migrants get the training and become the new wealthy.
Such anti-Australian policy is a slap in the face to both indigenous and local Australians. It fuels ethnic discontent. It neglects local education and vocational training needs. It views education as an export revenue earner - encouraging our schools and universities to skill and train foreigners who bring new money into the country. They the government labels it a 'foreign students industry' Is this Gillard's phoney 'education revolution'?
I wholeheartedly agree with you...'Our "workforce solutions" should be first and foremost about training and employing our own citizens, many who lack opportunities and jobs, not look overseas!'
This is not protectionism. This is not xenophobic. This is not racism.
This is getting Australian priorities right. This is looking after our own first, then once Australians are out of poverty, out of their Third World living standards, and regained equal opportunities again, any spare capacity can then be channelled to helping new Australians seeking a new life in Australia.
Anyone would think our Australian Government was being run and directed by immigrants.
"Skills shortages" in Australia?
In an Address to the Western Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry Workforce Summit in Perth, Senator Chris Evans claimed that the Governments Immigration reform is "designed to provide workforce solutions for the business community".
As a result of previous reforms, the current Government has increased the rate of state-sponsored skilled migration from 29% in 2007-08 to 55% in 2009-10.
At the same time, foreign students are cheating and getting special treatment to ensure they get their degrees, according to evidence gathered in a secret investigation by the Ombudsman. Victorian universities chasing a bigger slice of Australia's $17 billion a year foreign students industry have also been accused of pressuring staff to "dumb down" courses.
Ironically, we have a multi-billion dollar export education industry, but at the same time have "skills shortages" that require immigration to fill!
Perhaps if our universities and colleges had less prohibitive fees and there was more support for domestic students, our own young people, we wouldn't have to import "skills" from overseas! We are being bypassed by foreigners, with lower standards, instead of tax-payers and their offspring having access to good educational standards, training and secure employment.
Our "workforce solutions" should be first and foremost about training and employing our own citizens, many who lack opportunities and jobs, not look overseas!
Anglican branch stacking to combat ethics
In response to the recent initiative to trial teaching ethics to a sample of ten primary schools across Sydney, the Anglican Church is livid.
The Anglican Church's response is to 'encourage Christians to join school Parents and Carers committees in order to ''branch stack'' them with people who will speak up for religious education over the secular ethics classes being trialled in NSW primary schools'.
The church's justification: ''If Christians are not there in numbers to be the gospel voice of reason and honesty, our schools will be the poorer for it."
And this case of 'branch stacking' is the church being ethical?
We must protect our Judeo-Christian heritage
Nonie Darwish is a British Christian convert from Islam, founder of a group called Former Muslims United and author of two books highly critical of Sharia law, Arab policy towards Israel and Islamists' ambitions for global conquest. Darwish is a Christian who believes "that Judeo-Christian culture produces healthier, happier and more just societies, whereas Islamic culture produces tyrannical regimes and oppression". She campaigns against Sharia law and against those who threaten apostates.
A radical and dangerous change was proposed for Australia in March. A prominent Muslim leader called for parts of Islamic law (sharia) to be legally recognised in Australia. Nothing would damage Australia's international reputation, way of life and culture more than the introduction of sharia law.
We have a legal system that works perfectly well built on common sense and the common good. It has shaped our values and our culture and is constructed in accordance with our Judeo-Christian heritage. In some cases, domestic violence claims have resulted in husbands being asked to take anger management classes rather than more appropriate sentencing. There are draconian laws against homosexuals and easy access to divorce. Women are not entitled to the same inheritance laws as men. The European Court of Human Rights has determined that 'sharia is incompatible with the fundamental principles of democracy'.
The catholic church is not faultless and not without errors, but at least they are compatible with our Judeo-Christian heritage that should not be allowed to be eroded by "diversity" and foreign laws.
Sometimes Atheists take for granted their in a Judeo-Christian environment. We have free speech because of our Judeo-Christian heritage. Christianity is dying in the West, while Muslims are an ever increasing majority. Maybe the $86 m is the cost of protecting our heritage and the rights we take for granted. Due to atheists trying to "remove"Christianity in the West it creates a spiritual, cultural, and ideological vacuum to be sucked up.
Desalination pipe damages houses in Sydney's Kurnell
Anyone owning a house near or living close to Barwon Water's proposed pipeline better get together and seek top expert legal advice quickly.
They would do well to learn from the experience of residents of Sydney's Kurnell where "two years of (thunderous) drilling to create Sydney's desalination pipeline has created structural flaws in many of the houses in one street." ['Street of broken dreams', (23-May-10), by Erik Jensen in Sydney Morning Herald.]
A new 18km pipeline from the Sydney's new desalination plant at Kurnell to Erskineville has caused "at least 700 structural faults in 40 houses in Kurnell."
Now real estate agents do not list affected Dampier Street properties (in Kurnell) and rental properties are either vacant or are let at vast reductions.
And beware of the power of government to distance itself from liability..."Sydney Water investigations have confirmed that there have been no structural faults" and..."there is no evidence that the Sydney desalination project has impacted on property values.''
"[Read More]
Tiger Quoll
Snowy River 3885
Australia
Papua New Guinea’s Indigenous Landowners Stripped of Land Rights
Rainforestportal
PNG government amends Environment Act with no debate to remove powers from landowners to challenge in court resource development projects on their customary land. Move reflects increased pressure by foreign developers, particularly Chinese government’s mining agency, whose efforts to dump uncapped 100 million tons of mine waste on ocean floor in Madang Province has been thwarted by pressure exerted by successful legal efforts and campaigning.
(Madang, PNG) - Indigenous landowners have been stripped of ancestral and constitutionally-protected land rights by the government of Papua New Guinea (PNG). The fact that 97% of land has been under communal, customary land tenure has long been a source of pride, provided an important social safety net, and protected against resource corruption. Similar efforts pushed by the World Bank in the 1990s were met with national protests and over-turned. Ultimate power to irrevocably issue resource development environmental permits will now reside with the Department of Environment secretary, an office who’s current and past occupants have long been known for flagrant corruption.
The government, through the Environment Minister, Benny Allan, made changes to sections of the Environment Act 2000 to prevent landowners and concerned Papua New Guineans from “interfering” with industrial resource development projects destroying oceans and rainforests – like the Chinese Ramu Nickel Mine in Madang and Exxon-Mobil Liquid Natural Gas project in the Southern Highlands.
Without any warning or consultation, on May 27, 2010, the government of PNG introduced emergency legislation that dissolved the Constitutional rights of all landowners in PNG, including the right of Indigenous People to own land, challenge resource projects in court and receive any compensation for environmental damage. The bill was passed without being seen or debated by parliamentarians.
Chinese communist techniques are corroding Papua New Guinea’s democracy. Environment Act amendments reflect increasing Chinese communist control of the PNG government, and Prime Minister Michael Somare’s move towards authoritarian rule. The amended act makes communities powerless third parties as their resources are stolen. The most vulnerable in PNG society are being stripped of customary as well as English common law rights, denying democratic freedom. With no means to protect their land, families and culture; this can only lead to more Bougainville type revolutionary conflict, as landowners are pushed over the cliff, become desperate, and have no legal recourse to remedy legitimate grievances. states Dr. Glen Barry, Asples Madang and Ecological Internet President.
The Act refers to recent court decisions concerning the Chinese-owned Ramu nickel mine in Madang Province. The mine has been met with a great deal of resistance by local indigenous landowners, local NGOs and Ecological Internet because of its submarine tailings disposal plan that would dump more than 100 million tons of tailings waste into Basamuk Bay. A secret report commissioned by the PNG government recently confirmed "mine waste will not lie dormant on the sea floor, as claimed by the Chinese State owned Ramu mine, but will be widely dispersed in the Vitiaz Strait, notably towards Madang and Karkar Island and across Astrolobe Bay." This is one of the world’s last great tuna fisheries.
Sadly, with this new law in place, the largest Chinese mine outside of China is now free to dump into Madang’s Basamuk Bay with impunity. They don't even have to worry about getting fined. The Act’s amendments come after a petition against ocean waste dumping was presented to the Deputy Prime Minister and Environment Minister in Bongu Village, Madang Province on April 10th. In response, the corrupt regime chose to suppress the rights of landowners who are concerned about their lives and the environment. Without legal means to protect their land and seas from foreign resource invaders, there is already talk in Madang of “taking it up to the next level” and pursuing other means of resistance. It is highly unlikely the mine will ever commence as anger grows.
DISCUSS THIS ALERT: Rainforest portal blog and Facebook -ecointernet
Melbourne-Geelong Pipeline- all pipes go to Melbourne
Barwon Water has invited tenders for the supply of pipes, fittings and large valves for a Melbourne-Geelong interconnection project, located in Victoria.
It involves the construction of a 56.4 km underground pipeline and associated works to link Melbourne and Geelong’s water supplies.
The pipeline will deliver up to 16,000 MMl/a of water to Geelong, equivalent to half of the region’s current water usage.
According to the Victorian government, the pipeline will enable Geelong, the Bellarine Peninsula and the Surf Coast to tap into water projects such as the Sugarloaf Pipeline and the desalination plant planned from the end of 2011.
Who will pay for this infrastructure, the public! While our population keeps growing, for the sake of "the economy", the costs will continue to be a heavy burden on the people of Victoria for a basic necessity for life - water!
Peru puts kangaroo meat on the menu
ABC News
Peru government officials say their government has approved the import of kangaroo meat from Australia.
A notice published in a registry of new government rules and laws gave notice that the federal health officials had "authorised the import of meat from kangaroos born and raised in Australia".
Only kangaroo meat raised for the express purpose of being used for human consumption will be allowed for import.
(comment: just where do they get these supposedly "farmed" kangaroos for human consumption?)
Excluded are kangaroos killed as part of an eradication program or which died as a result of disease. Also off limits are animals coming from quarantined areas of Australia.
-AFP
Peruvians have a special connection with alpacas and Llamas. They are eaten sometimes, for ceremonial purposes, but mainly they are valued for their companionship and wool. Would they like us eating their national emblems?
Ambassador of Peru in Canberra
Mr Claudio De La Puente (from 1 August 2005)
E-mail: [email protected]
Minister
Mr Agustin De Madalengoitia Gutierrez
Second Secretary
Mr Julio Sanchez Cornejo
Administrative Officer
Ms Lucia Barda
E-mail: [email protected]
democracy a thin facade
Our democracy is a thin facade anyway. Just how many issues are we allowed to vote on? How many issues are we really allowed to influence through our votes or through our local Federal and State MPs? Once governments are in power, they do what they want. Kevin Rudd was voted into power to address climate change and now has negated this "greatest moral challenge of our time". We never asked for a "big Australia", contradictory to any climate change fix, yet we have no say over our numbers, and who makes Australia "home".
We are simply thrown a few crumbs to allure us to vote for these parties, but there is little difference between the Libs and the Labs! We are allowed mostly, to vote for our hip-pockets, as if that were all the voters were interested in! We are denied the big-picture issues that affect us, and our children, the most.
Unless people study the issues, and really do their "homework" on the alternative parties and independents, they will just take the easy route and vote for either the major parties - or none at all!
Updates on Peter Bethune's plight
Sea Shepherd's Conservation Society website provides regular updates on the plight of Captain Pete Bethune’s Trial.
As at 3rd June 2010, the site read:
The first phase of Captain Pete Bethune’s trial in Japan has ended and he remains both unbowed and in good spirits. Captain Bethune is being represented by a highly capable team of Japanese lawyers.
Though some in the media have written that Captain Bethune pleaded guilty to four out of five counts against him, this is incorrect, as Captain Bethune continues to maintain his innocence on all counts. He contested some of the facts claimed by the Japanese prosecutor, including, most importantly, that anyone on the Japanese vessel the Shonan Maru 2 was ever injured by anything done by anyone on a Sea Shepherd vessel. A crewmember from the Shonan Maru 2 claimed to have been injured by rancid butter tossed onto the Shonan Maru 2 by Sea Shepherd volunteers, but the evidence revealed that no doctor ever actually saw the alleged injury and there was no dispute that this crewmember was fine before his vessel ever arrived back in port.
Captain Bethune’s overall defense is based on the illegality of whaling and on the United Nations World Charter for Nature authorizing private organizations like Sea Shepherd to engage in government-like activities to protect the environment. The Shonan Maru 2 was engaged in illegal whaling and Captain Bethune’s actions against that vessel were the equivalent of a coast guard acting to stop it.
On the first day of the trial, Captain Bethune’s lawyers and the prosecutor read their opening statements, and one crewmember from the Shonan Maru 2 testified regarding what he had seen. On the second day of the trial, a crewmember from the Shonan Maru 2 testified regarding a minor three-day skin rash on about a one-inch patch of skin he attributes to rancid butter used by Captain Bethune. A doctor who never actually saw this crewmember (because his injury did not even warrant an in-person visit) testified that the injury could have been caused by rancid butter. Sea Shepherd has a strict policy against violence, and in its more than thirty years of operation, has never injured anyone.
Captain Bethune testified all day on the third day of trial as to why he had done what he did. He talked about his anger at the Japanese whalers killing whales in international waters. As Captain Bethune put it, “They are coming into my backyard and killing what belongs to all of us.”
The trial will resume on June 10th, at which time Captain Bethune’s attorneys and the prosecutor will read their closing statements. Captain Bethune himself will also read a statement in Japanese – intended for the court, the world, and, in particular, the Japanese people. It was entirely Captain Bethune’s idea to read his statement in Japanese; he wants to do that as a sign of respect for the Japanese people. It is important to him that Japan understand that neither he nor Sea Shepherd has ever had any problem with Japan or its people. The actions of Captain Bethune and of Sea Shepherd are designed to end whaling wherever it may be happening. The issue is whaling, not Japan.
After the June 10th hearing, the three judges in charge of trying Captain Bethune are expected to take anywhere from one to four weeks to issue their verdict and sentence, if any. Sea Shepherd’s fervent hope is that the judges will realize Captain Bethune violated no laws and will release him immediately. He has been in a Japanese jail since March 12th and he was held in custody on the Shonan Maru 2 prior to that, totalling well over 100 days in captivity to date. The Japanese Coast Guard continues to refuse to investigate the Shonan Maru #2’s intentional sinking of the Ady Gil (the ship that Captain Bethune was at the helm of) or even to cooperate with the ongoing investigations of the New Zealand and Australian maritime authorities.
Regular updates can be found at:
http://www.seashepherd.org/matilda/support-captain-bethune.html
Tiger Quoll
Snowy River 3885
Australia
Koalas under extinction from being burnt out.
It is a shame that you Vivienne, are not unlike the people who make these decisions, and do not come form the bush.
It is not the loggers that are causing the decline of koalas, but bushfires. National Parks and Wildlife lock everything up and leave it. This allows the undergrowth, and fallen trees, branches to build up. When a bushfire occurs, there is so much fuel that the trees are burnt to the top along with koalas. No one survives. Victoria is a prime example of this. Back burning is neccessary to save koalas, and the loggers who make roads aka fire trails through the bush are actually protecting them.
When will people learn....
Cousteau's Sin Of Omission
Or,as Bush Senior opined : we need the vision thing.
CEC a covert government wing?
If the CEC are not working for the government, they should be on the pay-roll.
Like the Socialist Alliance and the Greens, despite claims of wanting big changes, the CEC always seem to support the government of the day's overpopulation agenda and the suppression of democracy.
NSW Government wastes $86M on catholic recruitment drive
Sydney's newspaper, the Sun-Herald has just reported that annual catholic youth recruitment drive otherwise known as World Youth Day World, hosted by Sydney in 2008 cost taxpayers of $86 million. The original total cost estimate was $20 million, so it blew out by $66 million.
The Evangelistic Spin
Held between 15th to 20th July 2008, the forecast attendance of 'pilgrims' for WYD08 was supposed to be some 500,000. It was promoted to NSW taxpayers as promising a 'massive injection' into the Sydney economy...'the single largest gathering of people since the Sydney 2000 Olympics will generate tourism earnings, business opportunities, global brand positioning and cultural exchanges.'[Source: Sydney Chamber of Commerce].
In 2006, the NSW Department of State and Regional Development (DSRD) had undertaken an Economic Impact Analysis (EIA) in considering NSW hosting the World Youth Day event. DSRD estimated ‘the gross total direct and flow-on value added’ to New South Wales from hosting the event to be $152 million. But it excluded potential benefits from additional tourism, business generated, international media coverage and intangible costs such as business disruption.
NSW Minister for Finance at the time, John Watkins MP, claimed that the event would generate $190m in tourism revenue, and the Sydney Chamber of Commerce projected an even more optimistic estimate of $230m! [Crikey - 'NSW spending too much on World Youth Day? Pope a Catholic?']
Wonderful stuff one we were meant to believe!
The Reality
Well WYD08 officially attracted 223,000 registered pilgrims. [WYD08 website], even though the unofficial wiki website somehow claims "300,000 young people from 200 countries attended during the week, and more than 1,000,000 came for the weekend." Evangelism or facts?
An independent audit report by the NSW Audit Office into the World Youth Day Co-ordination Authority confirmed that the combined NSW and Commonwealth Government contributions came to $68.8M, while the Catholic Church contributed just $10M. Direct revenue totalled $10.5M.
The catholic event involved taking over Randwick Racecourse not just for the event but for four months preventing racing anytime between 6 September 2008 and 31 December 2008. The racing industry was compensated $41.1 million out of taxpayers money, even though the horse trainers at Royal Randwick had estimated the compensation should have been $50M.
Additional costs of turf replacement totalled $2.3M
The Undisclosed Costs
Other costs of services provided by other government agencies involved seconded staffing, dedicated policing including considerable overtime, yet according to the audit report "the cost of these services does not appear in the Authority’s financial report as the value could not be reliably determined."
So the full costs could have been more than double $86M! Yet, spite all the promises, the so-called international profile and economic benefits of Sydney's World Youth Day have still not been confirmed.
Could the $86M+ have been more equitably spent?
What tangible benefit did that $86M+ contribute to NSW society?
What were the opportunity costs of those millions?
According to a NSW Government Briefing paper on Homelessness in NSW:
"Data from the last Census in 2006 published by the Australian Bureau of Statistics in its “Counting the Homeless Report”, indicated that at the time of the last Census, there were approximately 104,676 people who were counted as homelessness, with approximately 27,374 people counted as homeless in NSW. There were also approximately 16,375 people who were “sleeping rough” in Australia on the night of the Census and approximately 3,715 people “sleeping rough” in NSW. The City of Sydney also recently conducted a street count of people “sleeping rough” on 17 February 2009. It found that there were 340 people “sleeping rough” in the CBD and surrounding suburbs, including Woolloomooloo, Kings Cross, Paddington, Glebe, Surry Hills, Ultimo and Redfern."
Compare the self-serving benefits to the catholic church of WYD08 of the $86M+ to what the social benefits could have been dividing the money equally between Mission Australia, The Salvation Army and the Red Cross - each charities providing direct tangible benefits to society's most needy.
New data from The Salvation Army reveals that in the past 12 months, 1 in 5 people (20%) coming to them have never asked for help from the Salvos before.
The Salvos estimate that in the past 12 months they have seen approximately 80,000 Australians in need come to their door for the first time ever.*
The Salvos need to raise $75 million nationally from this year’s Red Shield Appeal including $9.7 million from the big doorknock on 29 and 30 May.
Major Brad Halse, spokesperson for The Salvation Army, said, “Our services are stretched greatly. The demand on our frontline personnel is still huge. Without doubt many, many Australians in the cities and the bush are doing it tough. It doesn’t take a lot to tip struggling families into a situation where they desperately need help." [Source: Salvation Army website]
It ain't as if the catholic church is 'needy'
BRW magazine's investigative research has shown that churches generated almost $23 billion in 2004, with the Catholic Church turning over almost two-thirds of that.
The Catholic Church is almost five times larger than any other church and dominates the top 20 charities, the magazine says. It estimated the Catholic Church's gross revenue at $15 billion in 2004. The next largest was the Uniting Church with $3.1 billion.
The Catholic Education offices in NSW, Victoria and Queensland made up three of the top four charities. Several Catholic hospitals were in the top 20. BRW estimates the Catholic Church owns property and other assets worth more than $100 billion. [Source: 'Catholics lead rise in charity revenue', 23rd March 2005]
All the while, the catholic church, like all religious groups, do not pay tax. So the $8M+ of taxpayers dollars spent on WYD08 was effectively an annual religious recruitment drive by the catholic church.
'In 2005, BRW research found that the Catholic Church earned the bulk of the more than $23b in revenue earned by the ten largest religious groups - $16.25b. At the same growth rate identified by Adele Ferguson, this would be $20.47b in 2008. If even just 5% of that revenue was profit, that’s more than $300m that the Catholic Church will avoid this year in company tax alone. Ferguson estimated that the Church had more than $100b in assets, the bulk of which would be property – which would mean several hundred million dollars more in land tax that state governments are missing out on.
So, courtesy of our exempting religions from taxation, the Catholic Church alone keeps the best part of a billion dollars a year minimum. Throw in everyone else – the Uniting Church, the Anglicans, the happy clappers and their coffee chains, the Salvos – and we’re talking a billions of dollars a year in tax revenue forgone. The $160m being poured into the Youth Day is small beer indeed."[Source: NSW spending too much on World Youth Day? Pope a Catholic?'Bernard Keane on Crikey, 28th April 2008].
Conclusions and Questions
Not only has this event demonstrated the absolute ineptitude of the NSW Government to even come close to cost estimates for such major events (a four fold blowout), it has failed to publicly disclose the full public economic costs (such as policing and that of seconded agency staff), so the NSW Government has been less than honest with the people of NSW of whom it squandered their taxes.
What were the benefits from additional tourism, business generated, international media coverage and intangible costs such as business disruption?
The NSW Government has close ties with the catholic church and many of its cabinet ministers are catholic. At the time of the staging of World Youth Day, Premier Morris Iemma was catholic, Deputy Premier (and the minister responsible for World Youth Day) John Watkins was catholic, the Minister for Juvenile Justice, Barbara Perry was catholic, Minister for Ports and Waterways, Joe Tripodi, was catholic and the then Minister for Ageing, Kristina Keneally, who met her husband at a previous World Youth Day, was also catholic.
This $86M+ of taxpayers money going to a catholic church recruitment drive and appropriating Randwick Racecourse for a church group was not only a gross misuse of public monies and an inappropriate favouritism by government on a massive scale; it has compromised the democratic principles of separation of church and state. Clearly in NSW the two are not so separate. Imaging the outcry if Iemma and Watkins were members of the church of scientology and they arranged all this the same way!
The catholic church mislead the NSW government and the people of NSW with its inflated estimates of attendees and should be held financial responsible to reinburse the NSW Government for the shortfall. WYD08 only registered 223,000 pilgrims not the promised 500,000.
What 'massive injection' went into the Sydney economy? The NSW Government and the Sydney Chamber of Commerce need to clarify the actual revenues.
What contribution did the catholic church in NSW contribute to NSW society in 2008 by way of charity and humanitarian support in verifiable dollars? How does this compare with the likes of The Salvation Army, Mission Australia and the Red Cross? How much does the NSW Government contribute to these social charities on an annual basis?
How can the catholic church ethically request the NSW and Commonwealth Governments fund its WYD08 recruitment drive to the tune of $86M+, when many citizens of NSW were not asked and many are not catholic, do not want to be and object to their taxes being undemocratically used to fund a church festival?
How can the catholic church ethically request the NSW and Commonwealth Governments fund its WYD08 recruitment drive to the tune of $86M+, when the catholic church has been found to generate $15 billion in 2004 alone?
The catholic church has robbed taxpayers in self-serving recruitment drive , that it could have easily finance out of its bank account.
The catholic church has an ethical obligation to refund the $86 million less its own contributed $10m (so the balance of $76M) to the NSW and Australian taxpayers. The $76M should then ethically go directly to our society's most needy in provide tangible long term life-improving support and the full $76M be independently and publicly accounted for.
That would be an ethical use of taxpayers money.
An announcement from our Mandarin speaking PM.
Dear People of Australia ,
Due to the current financial situation caused by the slowdown of the
Economy, your Government has decided to implement a scheme to put
Workers 50 years of age and older on early retirement. This scheme
Will be known as RAPE (Retire Aged People Early).
Persons selected to be RAPED can apply to the government to be eligible
For the SHAFT scheme (Special Help After Forced Termination).
Persons who have been RAPED and SHAFTED will be reviewed under the
SCREW program (Scheme Covering Retired Early Workers). A person may be
RAPED once, SHAFTED twice and SCREWED as many times as the government
Deems appropriate.
Only persons who have been RAPED can get AIDS (Additional Income for
Dependants & Spouse) or HERPES (Half Earnings for Retired Personnel
Early Severance). Obviously, persons who have AIDS or HERPES will not
Be SHAFTED or SCREWED any further by the government..
Persons who are not RAPED and are staying on, will receive as much SHIT
(Special High Intensity Training) as possible. The government
Has always prided itself in the amount of SHIT it gives out. Should
You feel that you do not receive enough SHIT, please bring this to the
Attention of your local MP. They have been trained to give you all the
SHIT you can handle.
Sincerely,
Kevin Rudd
Canberra
PS: Have a nice life. . . . .
Why pillory planners?
Some would say that it is unfair to target planners. After all, they are working under the thumb of the developer-funded politicians. Well, to me they are like the Kapos---the Jews in the Warsaw ghetto whom the Nazis selected as delegates to organize and manage deportations to the camps. Planners are schooled in an ideology which assumes that growth is inevitable---if not good. Their job is to lubricate the process of growth by tiding it up and managing it. Some may rationalize their intervention as trying to blunt potentially negative impacts, but the net result is that their plans make growth more palatable.
I am not in awe of the profession. The most effective planning tool in most cases is neglect. Not building that bridge or not adding another runway to the local airport. Allowing congestion to finally reach a point where people decide to leave their cars at home or where businesses decide not to expand or locate in your city because air travel facilities can't cope with the volume. Say's Law stipulates that supply creates its own demand. Widen a highway or a bridge and in no time flat it becomes filled with more cars. New highways and bridges, by initially shortening commutes, allow realtors and developers to use this fact as a selling point to entice people to the new subdivisions served by the new highways and bridges. Then five or ten years on, commuters from these new subdivisions are clamouring for another highway or bridge. How many times do we have to witness this cycle before people get wise?
Planning for more growth is much like a dog chasing its tail. We are told that we must grow the tax base to provide for more services. But the infrastructure costs of new subdivisions and commercial parks out-strip the tax revenues that they return to city coffers. We are told that growth will create needed jobs. But new job opportunities attract outsiders to compete for those job opportunities, and while locals may gain employment, the unemployment rate is unaffected. There is an optimum population level for an locality. Beyond that, growth only offers diminishing returns. Why don't more people see through this scam?
Tim Murray
More is not necessarily better!
"-that the future of our civilization lies in growing cities". The problem is not with civililsation as such, in art, in knowledge, in architecture, but the idea that we can continue and keep growing and growing cities forever! People are not just economic units, fillers for the "planning" and be expected to comply, meekly!
No biological communities can grow forever. Growth is only one stage, then there has to be an equilibrium with other species, and natural resources. This is the trade-off period, when growing more will jeopardize the future and well being of the community and individuals. We are still biological creatures, and we must live harmoniously with our environment or else we destroy the basis of our existence.
A biological community can create conditions that lead to its own destruction. Human activities such as logging or clearing land to make agricultural or urban ecosystems can also destroy a biological community.
For example, as trees grow older, they become weak and vulnerable to destruction by insects or diseases. When this happens, a biological community ‘grows old’ and ‘dies’, and another biological community takes its place. We could over-grow our limitations to our own demise.
Grey kangaroo mugs Cathcart farmer, saved by kelpies!
Gotta luv ya 'Slav of Cathcart' (your comment above).
The Jim Beam must be flowing freely up there in them thar Monaro hills, lol.
You say "in recent years the number of Kangaroos increasen 10 times." Must be plague proportions them varmints god damn! lol
Wholly Molly! Them big greys now mug farmers wives from behind while check'n the fences along Big Jack Mountain Road out back?
A huge male too! She got 11 sutures by crike!
So we can expect to see her huge roo scar in the Monaro Post or The Land?
If you go down to the woods today,
You're in for a big suprise.
If you go down to the woods today,
You'll never believe your eyes.
For every bear that ever there was,
Is gathered there for certain because,
Today's the day the teddy bear's have their picnic.
Tiger Quoll
Snowy River 3885
Australia
anti-grwoth activists are too negative-use of language
Can we expand the viral mindshare and innovate real-time infomediaries ?
Yes we can!
Andalusian Lamb
Thank you for this timely article in your business section. You are right to celebrate the opportunities in maximising human resources. I wonder if you are aware that the business of having less biological diversity and more diverse people and choices in cuisine is now poised for a marketing leap, with optimistic and creative business planning, to educate people to be more accepting of cannibalism as a product of the educated and multicultural palate. Soylent Green, that bland product of a totalitarian state, was a dud on the market for good reasons. Predictably, it never sold well beyond the niche-market of remote airplane crashes and marooned arctic expeditions. Beyond those demographics, whenever competing food products were available, with the exception of a small cohort of illegal hobbyists, consumers would invariably choose the other-species competition. What the creative corporates are planning now is for Thai, Indian, African, Afghani, Spanish and Canadian ethnic human biscotti as a value-add product, putting the choice back into the product. Population growth, as ever, will keep demand and production rising in synergy, attracting the discriminating investor. Led as always by the creative expansion of the Real Estate Lobby, this spring Australian state parliaments will be voting on laws to overturn the early colonial protectionism which prevented the human biscotti from competing openly with the beef and sheep variety. We have this time provided protection for elite humans who might otherwise have become a target for black market operations, thus removing the last obstacles to these culinary reforms. What we anticipate is a continuous sort of chain production line with possibilities of expansion only limited by persistent ethical considerations in a few NIMBY change-resistant communities. We know from prior experience that we can break down that resistance by offering jobs to their children in the industry, who can probably even be convinced by TV cook-shows to prepare their own parents as food.
Advice
Keep hitting the council. If you are in Victoria, Police can issue fines or charges under the law. My best advice is to learn the law. Go to the internet and find the law for your state, then your local law. The state laws are superiour or Local Laws are Sub-ordinate to state laws. If you understand the laws, you have a better chance of getting them enforced. I would keep complaining to the council though. Call them all the time. Visit them and go to council meetings. Make sure you get involved by asking questions about the law in council. Keep complaining. Keep emailing ministers for local government and ministers of primary industry. Keep mailing your neighbours who are not the dog owners and ask them to join you or war will break out in your street in which they may get hurt. Ask them for support or you may subpeona them to court anyway. No one wants to go to court so they may get the message and support you.
Just go hammer and tong to get the peace you are entitled to. Just be persistent and never be silenced. NEver believe what council says if they say things like, "we must be fair to the dog owner" for if that is the case, they are not being fair to you. "We have to careful of malicious complainants" and ask them if they consider your complaints as malicious. "We do not want to get involved in neighbourhood disputes", dog barking is not a neighbourhood dispute, it is an unlawful condition being maintained by a dog owner for which you are a victim! "We will not investigate your complaint as we suspect there is another un-related issue" and as such, ask the council to provide proof of such issue and how it relates to dog barking, because this is the biggest joke of all and very misleading.
Council officers and managers throw these lines out, and the un-suspecting public buy them, usually. But if they say something, never believe it and ask how that affects your dog barking issue and why are they not stopping the barking. Managers get used to throwing out lines like this and downplaying things. Just do not put up with it and do not relent until they promice to stop the barking. If the barking continues, at this point, do not blame the dog owner, it is councils fault! FIght them!
Dog BArking.
Hello all. I am a victim of severe dog barking. So was another neighbour of mine and many friends at work. The issues of keeping pets are now so clear to me and I know exactly what is needed. NO JOKE!
My family was forced out of our home due to years of animal noises and drumming. It started with two years of drumming, thump, thump, thumping right through our home at a very rapid beat. The bass drum could not be heard in the front room until one lay their head on the pillow. You know sound travels further and faster through solid objects. As a shift worker, you try and sleep in the morning while this is going on. Begging pleading, making demands and threats to all I could to have it resolved. It finally stopped. Three months later, that very same neighour introduced us to dog barking. Every minute of every day was punctuated with barks and yaps. nearly another two years of this. At the same time, the neighbour next door to them (we were behind) was having troubles with the way these people conducted themselves in the street with noise and other goings on. We were labelled as malicious, vindictive, whingers and all sorts of things. Told to get a life etc.. Council did very little to stop the issues, same as the Police. Infact, the Police refused to enforce a law that they are nominated as the primary authority to be able to issue a charge of an offence, UNCONDITIONALLY!
Yep, we love our pets, and I loved the dogs I new in my family before I got married. I never got pets because I always felt it was not suited to my lifestyle and that I did not want such a burden. I did not want to clean up after them, I did not want to train them, I did not want to deal with noise and smell issues that may come from having a pet in the neighbourhood. I was man enough to view the full list of considerations one should have before buying a pet. I bought a fish tank and never filled it because I had second thoughts of what it entails, having had fish tanks filled with fish in my youth (I was very enthusiastic about African Cichlids - fish back then).
The issue is all about consideration with a broad view. The only way for people to consider properly these issues associated with pet ownership is through education. Some people are very panoramic in their views on many isues and may be able to consider these things before they are swayed by impulse. The following are absolutely what is needed to resolve these issues of human suffering in our communities, animal sudering and cruelty as well.
!. Do a course of animal care FOR ANY PET!
2. Get a licence to acquire ANY PET!
3. Get permission from the neighbours to obtain any pet that may affect their quality of life.
4. Present these documents to your council, or council may manage this procedure.
5. Prove ou have a proper, child roof enclosure for any pet.
6. Keep, train, maintain the health of any pet your own and contol its noise immediately!
7. Government must consider residential zones that are deemed pet free!
8. Specific laws on dog breed and size must be included in the licensing procedure;
a) A person must be informed of how to keep larger, more powerful dogs, which may cause harm to other people and animals.
b) A person must be educated on breed needs and suitability to suburban, or country lifestyles.
c) A person must learn about their responsibilities on pet ownership and the laws.
9. Compulsory insurance for any pet owner must be introduced so that those attacked by an animal being kept as a pet have access to full compensations needed for complete rehabitation or ongoing health expences.
10. Owners of animals that roam or cause serious injury to be held to account and face gaol terms if found negligent or contributing to the conditions where an injury by an animal resulted.
11. Barking is something that must be stopped AS SOON AS POSSIBLE, as it is known to cause health problems in communities.
So these are very basic concepts. In consideration before getting a dog, one must be very aware of barking problems. There is no excuse to cause a disturbance in the neighbourhood, and barking victims know all too well how damaging barking can be. Damages for me because of a barking dog, squawking bird and bad neighbours are ongoing. I was forced out of my home, resulting in tens of thousands of dollars lost to do so. I am forced to travel further to my work, costing me every week around thrity dollars. I was forced out of a municipality that showed no concern for my well being or no effort to enforce the laws. I have not been able to resolve this issue and I am now fighting this issue years after I have moved out of the troubled area. I am angry and I want justice, something that continually evades me to this day. The introduction of laws as I have described may resolve these issues for me, because I know, the very moment I have to deal with another barking dog issue, I will have years of torment on my hands, years more of injustice and may agian have a cost associated with it. There goes my retirement. Oh yeah, money I could put aside for my retirement is now significantly reduced, and we know the direction government is heading with pensions these days. So barking will have affected my life to my dying days. I am only 43 years old, still have many years to work.
You may consider a dog to be important to you and a "BENEFIT", but I assure you, many that have had dogs and made the conscious decision to not get a dog again have told me they have been liberated, have much more time for their family and better holidays and have so much more money available than before. Yep, get a dog if you like, but take aboard all the aspects of dog ownership too. And just because no neighbours complain about your dogs barking, does not mean it is not a disturbance. QUiet your dogs anyway, just to show you have consideration and compassion for your neighbours needs too.
Excellent post, John
Excellent post, John Marlowe, although you would not find that everyone agreed with your judgement about which politicians are trustworthy. There are a few names there that speak out of both sides of their mouths in different forums. What you say about the press is true, but the press isn't loyal to the two parties; the two parties are loyal to the press. Part of the awful predicament Australian politics has become results from a series of prime ministers giving the media barons more and more power over information. In truth it is the media which invents the political parties and chooses their captains. And the media is a big commercial corporation that shares investments with political parties and our parliaments make laws to privilege those investments.
Refuse to pay levies, rates and taxes
Sometime round the second world war a law was passed to make it possible to deduct tax from wages. In many other countries people can withhold their taxes if unsatisfied with the government. This right has been removed from Australians. We need to get it back. No Queenslander should pay rates, parking fines or any other monetary levy until Campbell, Bligh and the rest of the unrepresentative swill in power are removed from government or agree to stop population growth.
Sheila Newman, population sociologist
home page
Copyright to the author. Please contact sheila [AT] candobetter org or the editor if you wish to make substantial reproduction or republish.
Why would the people of Queensland pay more taxes?
The populations of Queensland and Western Australia are expected to more than double within the next 50 years.
The Queensland Government must consider an increase in taxes to manage future population growth, a new report has found. Population expert Professor McDonald warned that population growth "could not be slowed and the imposition of higher taxes may need to be considered".
Professor McDonald said that the Inquiry recognised community concerns about the pressures of continuing population growth and impacts on the quality of life. However, future growth is already "embedded in the state’s economy" and that there appears to be little immediate prospect of current growth rates in Queensland. In words, the addiction to growth is already set in to the mind-set and like the Titanic heading towards the iceberg, they can't change the course!
If we are supposed to get more "prosperity" from population growth, why must the Queensland government consider more taxes? It is a matter of limited supply and increasing demand for finite resources - environmental and infrastructure-wise! It probably spells disaster for Queensland's remaining wild koala populations.
Peak Oil
A very interesting overview and contrast of 2 periods in Australia with different population levels.
re Peak Oil- A US oceanographer interviewed on the ABC the other night said (among many things) regarding the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico and as though it was a given fact, that oil exploration and extraction is going into places that are decreasingly accessible.
I guess we can expect more of these oceanic disasters as we desperately try to obtain oil from diminishing reserves for an increasing global population.
The extent of the catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico seems to be a graphic indication of the strife we are really in.
Having finished my uni'
Having finished my uni' degree and having been looking for jobs I could do, I've yes, been on Newstart this year, so far! My experience with the Job Employment Network agency or organization Centrelink refer me to has been similar to that of one of the replies on here. It's actually quite un-user friendly when going there, to use the facilities... Stationary has to be requested each time and nothings just there for people to job search on their own. Ok there are two computers available for clients to just sit down on and a phone to call out for jobs, with a photocopier and printer. But the main room for job searching is normally for groups and sessions, not just walk-ins. I'm currently being 'weaned' off my Newstart payments and found employment all on my own, no thanks to the so-called professionals. Even with a Reduced Work Capacity for jobs and job seeking, there was no 'extra' assistance to find an appropriate job. My personal job-seeking and working experience has been done by my own efforts, and none of someone else or a group! I'd really hesitate before going to an Agency of any kind really; there're suss things that interviewers really want out of candidates for the sake of their clients.
SBS interview of Stable Pop Party Oz
Short but superb SBS Interview with William Bourke of Stable Population Party of Australiahttp://www.population.org.au/index.php/links/114-population-articles/294-radio-interview-of-william-bourke-stable-population-party-of-australia
Sheila Newman, population sociologist
home page
Copyright to the author. Please contact sheila [AT] candobetter org or the editor if you wish to make substantial reproduction or republish.
religions aren't irrelevant for large sections of society
Religions may be unethical but they aren't irrelevant because so many people are influenced by them. For this reason it seems important to give space to comments by sensible (and ethical) commentators within their forums on issues which are relevant to candobetter's objectives. You and I may have a natural tendency to ignore religions - I was never brought up in one - but the government, the media and many people do not.
Sheila Newman, population sociologist
home page
Copyright to the author. Please contact sheila [AT] candobetter org or the editor if you wish to make substantial reproduction or republish.
These fruit-cakes are at it again!
On Sunday, CEC activists stood up for the people against the genocide lobby, in a public forum in western Sydney which is one of the many forums of this kind being held around Australia. The CEC is fighting back against the well-publicised and "well-funded" (by who?) campaign fronted by “Kill-them” Thomson, Dick Smith and Bob Carr, to lay the blame for the visible crisis in Australia’s economy, such as run-down infrastructure, water shortages, on the number of people in Australia -rather than where the blame really lies, which is their globalisation policies.
This campaign aparently is accused of seeking to impose “solutions” to the manufactured crisis, such as health care rationing, shutting down the Murray-Darling Basin, blocking development of Australia’s northern region, etc. by killing people! Really! There's a difference between the problem and the solution, and cause and effect.
Of course, globalisation has caused a loss of jobs and training, but the problem of excessive population growth is multi-dimensional, and the financial implications of having to provide infrastructure, and artificially supplying water, means that the public ultimately have to pay for it, whether it is supplied by private or public enterprises.
See the web page with the video of the disruption
"“Whether you directly cull people like cattle by killing them en masse, or indirectly by denying economic development, infrastructure and industry, it’s all genocide." The second part is not a definition of "genocide" but one of their own creations! You can't kill people who don't exist!
Their interruptions were crude, inappropriate and showed a lack of intellectual input.
Do they really want to liquidate our natural biological support systems, and our biodiversity, in the quest to crowd as may people into Australia as possible! This idea would be the most foolish and misanthropic plan ever!
One would have to query their true intent, their true agenda?
Stable Pop Party Aust registered
We can now officially announce that the Stable Population Party has achieved the 500 members required for federal registration as a political party.
On 31 May 2010 we lodged our application for registration with the Australian Electoral Commission.
Thank you to everyone who supported the membership drive. It has been a big project with a range of invaluable contributions.
Here is a link to the latest newsletter from the Stable Population Party with the announcement:
http://www.populationparty.com/newsletter/newsletter_display.php?secID=108&id=164
It is my view that an election in August is quite possible - perhaps 50/50 - which would prevent us from standing candidates under the party name. We need to complete the (approximately 12 week) registration process before the election is called.
That is out of our hands, so we will now progress with other aspects of the party's development and wait for news from the AEC and the Rudd Government.
Kind regards
William Bourke
Stable Population Party of Australia
www.populationparty.com
Usually however the
Usually however the offenders are not caught and all we are left with is a dead kangaroo with a rope tied around its tail as was the case in Gidgegannup..
No more nations to plunder
It is because the increase in the world's population has been accompanied by such a rapid rise in the quality of life on earth that the population of the planet is larger than ever before. Economic growth brought by the Industrial Revolution and by capitalism's triumphant march through the 19th and 20th century has vastly bettered the conditions of human existence. However, cause and effect are hard to trace in human affairs. The industrial revolution was spurred on by the availability of energy and human resources. The continuation of growth and industrialisation are assumed will continue to bring prosperity despite world-changing conditions and crisis that exist today. Once we are over our optimum level of growth, and finite resource on our planet are compromised and exhausted, there will be nothing to gain by expanding. There are no more potential nations to colonise, and no more new oceans to plunder. Lack of water and peak oil should rein in population growth in Australia, and elsewhere, and let's hope it destroys globalisation and brings back local manufacturing, local jobs, home-grown renewable energy sources, national pride and patriotism.
Kangaroo population control
You do not know what You are talking about. I am a farmer in Cathcart, NSW. In recent years the number of Kangaroos increasen 10 times. I am talking about the big Easter Gray ones. They are not affraid anymore. My wife was checking the fences along Big Jack Mountain Road couple of days ago. Was suddenly kicked in back by a huge male; lackily our 3 Kelpies were nearby and saved her. She got 11 sutures, due to come off tomorrow.
Do not get into subjects You have no idea about!
Slav
cruelty to animals
I am very pleased to see thisorganisation being formed.
Cruelty will always exist as long as people are prepared to eat meat.Eating meat is another form of cruelty.I have printed a slogan which reads CRUELTY BEGINS AT HOME ON YOUR DINNER PLATE.Unfortunately there are many organisations that form with good intentions but are not prepared to tackle the problem head on.To eliminate cruelty the meat industry must be totally shut down.This is a very difficult task as the largest animal murderers are very powerfull,own the media and or can buy it.It is also the road to the enslavement of mankind being the least intelligent animal on this planet.
As for the idea that the population growth should be zero,i find it very strange that we can have approximately 135million beautifull sheep,35million cows,billions of chicken and millions of other beautifull,intelligent and loving animal just to be slaughtered to satisfy some mentally de arranged humanoid.I hope that all your members are vegetarian or prefably vegans and if so wonderfull,if not the party is compromised from the outset.In spite of what I have said i wish you luck and am proud of you for doing quite a bit towards this disgusting DR MANGELS attitude towards our beautiful children the animals.
Jacko's kangaroo plague myth to justify slaughtering wildlife
Re: Jacko's hysterical 'hysterical nonsense' comment above of 28th May 2010:
In response:
1. Jacko claims: "this article is hysterical nonsense."
My response:
Crap. Where's the hysteria? The above article describes factual events. It offers an opinion and it compares the treatment of wildlife in 2009 and 2010 to the treatment of Aboriginals by colonists up until 1928. Actually the article should have included the Appin Massacre of 14 Aboriginals on 17 April 1816 "as a result of the orders issued by Governor Macquarie in 1816." It should have included the many Aboriginal deaths in custody including the bashing of Mulrunji Doomadge on Palm Island on 19th November 2004 and that of Ian Ward while being transported in a privately run prison van in searing heat on January 27, 2008.
2. Jacko claims: "It is a defamation of the aboriginal people, putting them on the same level as native animals"
My response:
Jacko has either naively misinterpreted my comparison or more likely deliberately selectively read the article and twisted it to cause offence. Jacko's criticism is a desperate fallacious attempt intended to change the subject through digression and false emphasis.
My argument is that the contempt for Aborigines in Australia's colonist and recent history as vermin is comparable to the treatment of Australia's wildlife as vermin. Both are utterly despicable. This argument does not compare Aborigines to wildlife. It compares the similarity of backward attitudes of colonists to neo-colonists.
3. Jacko claims: "My objection to the controlled (RSPCA) killings is that the meat was wasted... the numbers got out of hand. Controlled slaughter and use of the valuable meat is the solution. Anyone who knows Australia knows that kangaroo species are far from extinction, reaching- artificial - plague proportions in many areas."
My response:
The justifications for the slaughter of about 4500 kangaroos at Belconnen and Majura has been discredited. It was purely to clear the way for real estate development (now underway) and as a convenience for Army training by Duntroon cadets.
The "wasting meat" argument is separate from the justification argument. Killing wildlife is wrong. Commercial trade in wildlife parts including meat is wrong. Two wrongs don't make a right.
Using the spoils of immoral wildlife mass slaughter may well have been an incentive for the slaughter on its own. If the meat was not used, would the slaughter have been supported or proceeded. With the kangaroo industry denied the spoils and profit, what would the ACT Government have done? Would the cost of disposing of 4500 odd kangaroo carcasses have been prohibitive?
The 'wasting meat' argument could be applied to the many cats and dog euthanased by the RSPCA every month.
Can Jacko honestly proclaim no personal involvement or commercial gain in this slaughter that would have framed his opinion?
4. Jacko claims: "Anyone who knows Australia knows that kangaroo species are far from extinction, reaching- artificial - plague proportions in many areas."
My response:
The kangaroo plague myth is a tired, unproven pious fraud. Where are the facts?
Tiger Quoll
Snowy River 3885
Australia
I have not the slightest
I have not the slightest hesitation in saying that if this planet makes it through the next 50 years to sustainable and just ways it will be via some kind of Transition Towns process. retirement communities in arizona
ISOFIX
Of course the current car seats are a nightmare that’s why 25 years ago Australia and a number of other countries started to develop the new standard or car seat. 10 years ago these seats hit the market in UK Europe and even the USA (that place where seatbelts were not mandatory in all states) These seats fit correctly every time with little to no training. They are simple and easy to move between cars. Simple to drop off at the day care / school and pick up on the way home. Why are they not here?
I paid a couple of hundred dollars for each of my child's car seats. They will last for a number of years, so not much cost over time. My wife is now working so I am looking at another two just to get them to and from home. So some of the first weeks wage will go into car seats.
I could walk to the local school! Perhaps if I skip spending money fixing my breaks, or that leaky exhaust - it’s not they are that important. I am a carful driver I can slow down before I need to stop. Will be fine so long as no one else is on the road. Hmm maybe not. I know I will skip buying the expensive fire resistant pj's or proper shoes, perhaps the smoke alarm battery - I never have fires.
Kids cost money car seats, Braces, time off when they are sick, child care, clothes, correct foot ware. You can skimp in many areas and your child may not be the worse off - but if you think that’s OK are you really being the parent you should be? Will they thank you for it in the long run? Should we be happy with others low standards for their defenceless children?
Never forget the victims and the church complicity
Never forget the victims; the victims never will forget.
Never forget the complicity of the churches of the immoral crimes by trusted immoral priests. To ignore, to cover up is to be complicit.
Agent Provocateur says above:
"No free kicks, witch hunts or 'free for alls' - respectful, reasoned argument must always prevail if any kind of change for the better, is to be accomplished.
We Can All Do Better than this'.
Yes, these are appropriate questions for the church and society. Indeed the church can do better, or deserved to become more irrelevant and rightfully shunned by an increasing number in society. The future of church is up to its fraternity.
Hook, Line and Gullible