The Survival website says that the The Yanomami are the largest relatively isolated tribe in South America. They live in the rainforests and mountains of northern Brazil and southern Venezuela. The Brazilian congress is currently debating a bill which, if approved, will permit large-scale mining in indigenous territories. This will be extremely harmful to the Yanomami and other remote tribes in Brazil.
If you are an Australian, this process of land-loss and induction into the market economy probably happened to your ancestors. Contrary to what we are told by missionaries, Foreign-Aid organisations and growth economists, hunter-gatherers who retain their territory and make a traditional living from it, never want to be 'developed'. They always resist but ' development' resulting in dispossession, poverty and then overpopulation, is invariably forced upon them.
Let us try to help the Yanomami and the other tribes of South America, as we should all hunter-gatherers, to retain their land and freedom.
Update, 28 Nov 2013: No mention was made of Syria by Albanese, Shorten or the audience in the leadershipdebate of 24 September. (Whilst this could have been because of time constraints, it seems a surprising omission.) On 20 April, 2013, Anthony Albanese, a candidate for the national leadership of the Labor Party by membership ballot,1 expressed 2 his support for Syria3. This is contrary to how much of the senior leadership of the Labor Party has acted. 4 For two and a half years they supported the United States as Syria has tried to defend itself against invasion by proxy terrorists armed, paid for and supplied by the United States. This war has, so far, since March 2011, cost 100,000 lives.
Although Labor is no longer in Government following its defeat at the elections of 7 September 2013, Anthony Albanese's support for Syria is a welcome change to the collusion of senior members of the previous Labor Government with the United States in its war against Libya and the proxy terrorist war Syria. Kevin Rudd, as "roving" Australia Foreign Minister in the Middle East in March 2011, colluded with the UnitedStates to help create the international environment that enabled the U.S and its NATO allies to bomb and invade Libya in 2012. Since then, both Kevin Rudd and former Foreign Minister BobCarr have colluded to help facilitatethe terrorist war against Syriaby the United States.
The above video is cause to hope that Labor may to return to its past tradition of opposing unjust wars as exemplified by the withdrawal of Australia from the Vietnam War by the newly elected Labor Prime Minister Gough Whitlam in December 1972. Had Labor as a whole so vocally opposed the war against Syria, the level of the political discussion during the election campaign would have been raised and the outcome of the 7 September elections may well have been different.
Footnote[s]
#fn3465_1" id="fn3465_1">1. #txtSubj1">↑ Nominations for the ballot of Labor Party members for the National leadership closed on 20 September, according to an ABC report.
#fn3465_3" id="fn3465_3">3. #txtSubj3">↑ As appears to be mandatory, Anthony Albanese also expressed his support for 'multi-culturalism'. Whilst Syria can rightly be held up as an example of different cultures living in harmony alongside each other for centuries, most notably, between Christians and Muslims, the same cannot be said for Australia, where multiculturalism has been used since the 1970's as a smokescreen to enable governments to impose high immigration.
As a consequence, native Australian workers have had their working conditions reduced or have been replaced altogether. The most infamous example is Section 457 visas by which employers are able to import workers with the supposed skills they claim to need in preference to properly training their own workforce, with on-the-job training or apprenticeships. 'Temporary' backpacker workers are employed in industries such as fruit-picking where that work was once available to low-skilled native workers or university students on summer vacation.
Another effect of high immigration, welcomed by by landlords and property speculators, is to ensure a scarcity of housing stock, thus driving up the prices that can be demanded of tenants and home-buyers.
#fn3465_4" id="fn3465_4">4. #txtSubj4">↑ how this was dealt with in the Federal Labor Parliamentary Caucus, would be very interesting to know, as much of Bob Carr's most explicit and determined encouragement of U.S. military aggression against Syria followed Anthony Albanese's speech.
Perhaps Bob Carr's sudden resignation from the Senate is not such a mystery given the failure of President Obama, John Kerry, himself, Kevin Rudd and their international allies to win international diplomatic support for their war plans.
Sadly, Kevin Rudd has not resigned from Parliament and it can't be completely ruled out that he will again attempt to contest the national leadership. However, Bob Carr has vanished completely from public view. Nothing more has been posted to his web-site Thoughtlines with Bob Carr since 2 Sep 2013.
Today we heard the outcome of the Orrong Towers development case where Stonnington council went to the Supreme Court to try to have residents' and citizens' opinions heeded in planning what happens in their immediate environment. The Court completely failed to recognise this fundamental right to self-government. Having been present at the first hearing, I cannot imagine how this was justified and await the ratio dicendi.
Victorian ABC mainstream media was inadequate to the situation:
"I have just heard Jon Faine (presenter) on ABC radio speaking to Margot Carroll who has led this battle. Today the Supreme Court after a 5 minute hearing dismissed Stonnington Council's case against the proposed development. The distressing point that Margot made was that the court did not consider the number of objections to lend any weight to the case so that 10,000 objections was the same as 10. Interestingly on the same radio station the same presenter is discussing planning issues with a panel of "experts". The first question was about the ingredients of a livable city and the answer was "community involvement" in planning! I also heard one of the experts saying that growth was an "opportunity" (in livability I presume)! Someone also said that not all developers want to maximise profit at the expense of "design"." (They must be the public benefactor developers.) - Comment by Quark to candobetter.net
The contrast between the reality of the planning dictatorship we live under and the psalmodious platitudes we hear from its media mouthpieces is fundamentally confusing. Today I came home to yet another government pamphlet asking for public comment about new zoning laws. In the light of the Orrong Towers decision and comments like those quoted from Jon Faine's show, it was disturbing to realise that the smiling politician featured on the pamphlet is only a mask on the face of raw and brutal power. One knows that any comments will be ignored and that laws are being changed and reinterpreted for state policy to permit the removal from the community everything that made this country pleasant and easy to live in.
There must be many planners ashamed to be associated with this psychological and legal bulldozing of communities, but they are all too scared of losing work to stand up to the bullying of communities and individuals. Capitalism has made most people too vulnerable to speak up and the comments of those who do speak up do not have value in the eyes of the law. It's official.
As Montesquiou wrote: "There is no greater tyranny than that which is perpetrated under the shield of law and in the name of justice."
A devastating decision for Stonnington and Victoria
"Supreme Court decision further erodes objectors’ democratic planning rights.
re: Case – VCAT ruled that `the extent of resident opposition is irrelevant `.
Respondents – Stonnington Council V Lend Lease & Larkfield Pty Ltd
Project – 590 Orrong Road Armadale proposed development.
The Orrong Group is devastated at the Supreme Court decision delivered this morning. The finding supports the VCAT ruling that `the extent of resident opposition is irrelevant’ to their consideration of the merits of a development.
Based on this ruling the voices of the community will not have their collective concerns given due consideration in the planning process regarding inappropriate development in any neighbourhood, anywhere.
Stonnington Council, the responsible authority will have its planning powers diminished and residents input and support further eroded.
The disastrous Supreme Court ruling, further compounded by grossly increased VCAT fees, will result in vastly reduced objections and community views not fully reflected in VCAT deliberations. The Stonnington community and all Victorians will experience increased inappropriate development with permanent deleterious impact on neighbourhood character and community cohesion.
Members of the Victorian Government directly involved in this matter should now act to deliver more than simple platitudes regarding respect for all communities’ democratic rights and views regarding how their neighbourhood will develop.
Orrong Group is now in its fourth year and will continue to fight the towers. Orrong Group wishes to express its gratitude to City of Stonnington which decided to appeal VCAT’s decision and fight the towers."
In March 2011 'roving' Australian Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd, then in the Middle East called for the establishment of aso-called "no-fly zone" over Libya. This helped prepare the groundwork for NATO's subsequent invasion of Libya. The Australian government, whose delegate to the United Nations currently holds the office of President of the United Nations' Security Council, has supported United States as it has waged a proxy terrorist war against Syria that has already cost 100,000 deaths in two and a half years. The hostility towards Syria by the previous 'Labor' Government, which was voted out of office on 7 September, is apparently to be continued by the new Liberal/National Coalition Government according to the new Foreign Minister, Senator Julie Bishop.
The Australian mainstream media, including the ABC, SBS the Fairfax and Murdoch newsmedia, has persistently lied to the Australian public about Syria. The most recent example is the ludicrous claim that the Syrian Government, which, as even NATO acknowledged, has the support of 70% of Syrians, killed 1,400 Syrians with chemical weapons. The claim that the Syrian government used chemical weapons has since been comprehensively demolished in a number of articles on the web. One such article, by Tony Cartalucci, the creator of the Land Destroyer Report is included below.
September 17, 2013 (Tony Cartalucci) - As predicted days before the UN's Syrian chemical weapons report was made public, the West has begun spinning the findings to bolster their faltering narrative regarding alleged chemical weapon attacks on August 21, 2013 in eastern Damascus, Syria. The goal of course, is to continue demonizing the Syrian government while simultaneously sabotaging a recent Syrian-Russian deal to have Syria's chemical weapon stockpiles verified and disarmed by independent observers.
Image: 107mm rocket shells frequently used by terrorists operating within and along Syria's borders. They are similar in configuration and function to those identified by the UN at sites investigated after the alleged August 21, 2013 Damascus, Syria chemical weapons attack, only smaller.
A barrage of suspiciously worded headlines attempt to link in the mind of unobservant readers the UN's "confirmation" of chemical weapons use in Syria and Western claims that it was the Syrian government who used them. Additionally, the US, British, and French governments have quickly assembled a list of fabrications designed to spin the UN report to bolster their still-unsubstantiated accusations against the Syrian government.
The UN report did not attribute blame for the attack, as that was not part of its remit.
However, that did not stop UK Foreign Secretary William Hague who claimed:
From the wealth of technical detail in the report - including on the scale of the attack, the consistency of sample test results from separate laboratories, witness statements, and information on the munitions used and their trajectories - it is abundantly clear that the Syrian regime is the only party that could have been responsible.
And US ambassador to the UN Samantha Power who stated:
The technical details of the UN report make clear that only the regime could have carried out this large-scale chemical weapons attack.
French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius is also quoted as saying:
When you look at the findings carefully, the quantities of toxic gas used, the complexity of the mixes, the nature, and the trajectory of the carriers, it leaves absolutely no doubt as to the origin of the attack.
The Washington Post went one step further, and perhaps foolishly, laid out a detailed explanation of each fabrication the West is using to spin the latest UN report. In an article titled, The U.N. chemical weapons report is pretty damning for Assad, 5 points are made and explained as to why the UN report "points" to the Syrian government.
1. Chemical weapons were delivered with munitions not used by rebels: This claim includes referencing "Syria watcher" Eliot Higgins also known as "Brown Moses," a UK-based armchair observer of the Syrian crisis who has been documenting weapons used throughout the conflict on his blog.
While Higgins explains these particularly larger diameter rockets (140mm and 330mm) have not been seen (by him) in the hands of terrorists operating within and along Syria's borders, older posts of his show rockets similar in construction and operation, but smaller, most certainly in the hands of the militants.
The Washington Post contends that somehow these larger rockets require "technology" the militants have no access to. This is categorically false. A rocket is launched from a simple tube, and the only additional technology terrorists may have required for the larger rockets would have been a truck to mount them on. For an armed front fielding stolen tanks, finding trucks to mount large metal tubes upon would seem a rather elementary task - especially to carry out a staged attack that would justify foreign intervention and salvage their faltering offensive.
2. The sarin was fired from a regime-controlled area: The Washington Post contends that:
The report concludes that the shells came from the northwest of the targeted neighborhood. That area was and is controlled by Syrian regime forces and is awfully close to a Syrian military base. If the shells had been fired by Syrian rebels, they likely would have come from the rebel-held southeast.
What the Washington Post fails to mention are the "limitations" the UN team itself put on the credibility of their findings. On page 18 of the report (22 of the .pdf), the UN states [emphasis added]:
The time necessary to conduct a detailed survey of both locations as well as take samples was very limited. The sites have been well travelled by other individuals both before and during the investigation. Fragments and other possible evidence have clearly been handled/moved prior to the arrival of the investigation team.
It should also be noted that militants still controlled the area after the alleged attack and up to and including during the investigation by UN personnel. Any tampering or planting of evidence would have been carried out by "opposition" members - and surely the Syrian government would not point rockets in directions that would implicate themselves.
3. Chemical analysis suggests sarin likely came from controlled supply: The Washington Post claims:
The U.N. investigators analyzed 30 samples, which they found contained not just sarin but also "relevant chemicals, such as stabilizers." That suggests that the chemical weapons were taken from a controlled storage environment, where they could have been processed for use by troops trained in their use.
Only, any staged attack would also need to utilize stabilized chemical weapons and personnel trained in their use. From stockpiles looted in Libya, to chemical arms covertly transferred from the US, UK, or Israel, through Saudi Arabia or Qatar, there is no short supply of possible sources.
Regarding "rebels" lacking the necessary training to handle chemical weapons - US policy has seen to it that not only did they receive the necessary training, but Western defense contractors specializing in chemical warfare are reported to be on the ground with militants inside Syria. CNN reported in their 2012 article, Sources: U.S. helping underwrite Syrian rebel training on securing chemical weapons, that:
The United States and some European allies are using defense contractors to train Syrian rebels on how to secure chemical weapons stockpiles in Syria, a senior U.S. official and several senior diplomats told CNN Sunday.
The training, which is taking place in Jordan and Turkey, involves how to monitor and secure stockpiles and handle weapons sites and materials, according to the sources. Some of the contractors are on the ground in Syria working with the rebels to monitor some of the sites, according to one of the officials.
4. Cyrillic characters on the sides of the shells: The Washington Post claims:
The Russian lettering on the artillery rounds strongly suggests they were Russian-manufactured. Russia is a major supplier of arms to the Syrian government, of course, but more to the point they are not a direct or indirect supplier of arms to the rebels.
Additionally, had the attacks been staged by terrorists or their Western backers, particularly attacks whose fallout sought to elicit such a profound geopolitical shift in the West's favor, it would be assumed some time would be invested in making them appear to have originated from the Syrian government. The use of chemical weapons on a militant location by the militants themselves would constitute a "false flag" attack, which by definition would require some sort of incriminating markings or evidence to accompany the weapons used in the barrage.
5. The UN Secretary General's comments on the report: The Washington Post itself admits the tenuous nature of this final point, stating:
"This is perhaps the most circumstantial case at all, but it's difficult to ignore the apparent subtext in Secretary General Ban Ki-moon's news conference discussing the report..."
That the Washington Post, and the interests driving its editorial board, could not even produce 5 reasonably convincing arguments as to why the UN report somehow implicates the Syrian government casts doubt on claims regarding the "wealth of technical detail" pointing in President Bashar al-Assad's direction.
The UN report confirms that chemical weapons were used, a point that was not contended by either side of the conflict, before or after the UN investigation began. What the West is attempting to now do, is retrench its narrative behind the report and once again create a baseless justification for continued belligerence against Syria, both covert and as a matter of official foreign policy.
Help needed, and it won’t take but a moment of your time. Here in Macedon Ranges Shire we have a terrible council. It thinks it can operate and make decisions in isolation of and without consulting its community, while making the community pay for its decisions. Recently Macedon Ranges council took this culture a step too far. It deliberately resolved (not once, but twice) to apply for funding for a conference centre (and other large-scale development) at Hanging Rock and to not consult the community on the development or funding.
Hanging Rock does not belong to Macedon Ranges’ council officers and 5 of 9 councillors! It is an international icon; it belongs to the people of Macedon Ranges, Victoria, and Australia. Yet our council has shut everyone out. It’s making big decisions on our behalf – and on yours – without us having a say. We want our council to know this is not acceptable, and to rethink its decision.
The first favour we ask of you is PLEASE, PLEASE SIGN THE ONLINE PETITION “HANGING ROCK FOR SALE – HAVE YOUR SAY” by going to http://www.communityrun.org/petitions/hanging-rock-for-sale-have-your-say
This petition has been authored and started by local residents in the Hanging Rock area community. MRRA is supporting this initiative.
The second favour we ask is PLEASE, PLEASE SEND THIS EMAIL AROUND TO YOUR FRIENDS AND CONTACTS AND ASK THEM TO SIGN THE PETITION AS WELL.
Here’s what some people are saying:
“If you have visited the Rock at some stage in your life you know the beauty and mysteriousness of the area, if you have not visited the Rock please google it and you will see what I mean. I live near the Rock and drive past it every day to and from work and it never ceases to amaze me because I see the same view but it’s different. I implore you to sign this petition to put a stop to the suggested development around the area of the Rock; Landcare has spent 10 years building up the wildlife corridor here and as usual greedy people just want to tear the bush down and put in concrete. Once you have signed it please email this to all your friends so we can save a natural beauty so close to Melb for visitors.” Toni
“Development such as that being proposed by MRSC in an area protected by an environmental overlay is totally inappropriate. It goes against all that this Landcare group has been working towards over a 10 year period! The East paddock area was purchased to buffer the reserve at Hanging Rock - a haven for wild-life and city-weary folks. So please add your name to the petition Luke has prepared and send it [the link] to your friends.” Penny
As you can see, this awful decision affects many people and impacts many (irreplaceable) values.
Many thanks for your help.
Note that Mr Abbott's 2010 policy on population growth still amounted to wanting to have his cake and eat it, in the sense of wanting 'sustainability' but growth at the same time. He does say, however, that "Australia needs a population that our services can satisfy, our infrastructure can support, our environment can sustain, our society can embrace, and our economy can employ." Unfortunately he seems to want to leave the judgement of what this is up to the productivity commission, which seems to be entirely incompetent to assess ecological sustainability. Will Mr Abbott toe the line of his political promoter, the Murdoch Press, by keeping Australian targeted for continuing overpopulation, or will he use his big majority to carve out something more democratic? Clive Palmer, probably correctly, described Abbott as a B.A. Santamariaist" on Q & A tonight.
Australia needs a population that our services can satisfy, our infrastructure can support, our environment can sustain, our society can embrace, and our economy can employ.
Australia's population growth since World War II has helped create the prosperity we now enjoy. Successive waves of post-war migration have expanded our capacity as a nation.
Under the Howard Government, our immigration programme enjoyed support from a majority of Australians who were confident that the programme was fair, competently administered, and delivering benefits to the entire community.
Under Labor, migration-fuelled population growth has caused Australians to become increasingly concerned, and to lose confidence in our broader immigration programme.
The hopeless failure of Labor’s border protection regime has further eroded community trust.
Under Labor, net overseas migration has risen to 300,000 people per year, against a long run average of around 140,000 per year. [Candobetter.net editorial comment: Actually it was more like 80,000 per year until Howard ramped it up, but it is true that it has increased even more under Labor - see Graph above, based on Australian Year Books and ABS stats].
At this rate Australia’s population would reach 42.3 million people by 2050, significantly above the earlier Intergenerational Report II (IGR) forecast of 36 million.
As a result, the quality of life for Australians living in our major urban areas today is under great pressure.
Fuelling population growth today must not rob future generations of the quality of life and opportunities we currently enjoy. That is what sustainability is all about.
On the eve of an election, Labor politicians have suddenly started to say they no longer believe in a “big Australia” – while cynically trying to put off any decisions on these issues until after the election.
While Labor may have changed its rhetoric under its new leader, Labor’s policies on immigration or population have not changed.
The Coalition believes it is necessary to ease population growth to deliver more sustainable population levels, based on our present and future capacity, so that our infrastructure, services and environment can catch up.
Unlike Labor, the Coalition’s population and immigration policy is clear.
The Coalition will:
1. Establish ‘Guard Rails’ for Population Growth
The Coalition will set clear parameters for population growth by tasking a renamed Productivity and Sustainability Commission to advise on population growth bands that it considers are sustainable.
This recommendation will provide a Coalition Government with the expert advice necessary to establish the framework for setting migration programmes.
2. Take Real Action on Immigration
The Coalition will reduce Australia’s annual rate of population growth from more than 2 per cent under Labor, to our historical long-run average of 1.4 per cent within our first term.
This will require reducing our annual rate of net overseas migration from 298,924 in 2008/09 to no more than 170,000 per year by the end of our first term.
3. Make a Clear Commitment to Skills Migration and Regional Australia.
The Coalition will ensure that two-thirds of our permanent migration programme will be for the purposes of skilled migration.
A Coalition Government will also quarantine the level of employer nominated skills migration and 457 temporary business visas to at least the levels it inherits. In addition, the Coalition will liberalise arrangements for temporary business visas (457s) subject to clear standards, to make them more accessible to business, especially small businesses, and business in regional areas, with proven skills shortage needs. [= Yes, repeat No? – Mark’s comment]
To address the skills needs of regional areas and small business, the Coalition will encourage the settlement on either a temporary or permanent basis of new arrivals in regional and rural areas.
States such as Queensland and Western Australia will be afforded a high priority for permanent and temporary skilled visa applications.
A Coalition Government would also seek to resettle more entrants from our refugee and humanitarian programme in regional areas, where these resettlement programmes have proved to be highly successful.
4. Establish A Clear and Consultative Process to Restore Control
The Coalition will produce a White Paper on immigration that will reframe the structure and composition of Australia’s immigration programme to address the policy challenges of sustainable population growth.
A Discussion Paper will be released by the end of 2010, with a final paper to be completed by the Coalition’s first Budget in May 2011. This will help inform the composition of the 2011-12 migration programme.
Australians want their government to take control of population and immigration policies to restore confidence and ensure our immigration and population levels are sustainable and in the national interest.
The Coalition’s plan for Real Action on Sustainable Population Growth will restore confidence and re-establish consensus on the benefits of our immigration programme."
California has 157 endangered or threatened species, looming water shortages, eight of the 10 most air-polluted cities in the country and 725 metric tons of trash 1 washing up on its coast each year.
California also has 38 million people, up 10 percent in the last decade, including 10 million immigrants. They own 32 million registered vehicles and 14 million houses. By 2050, projections show 51 million people living in the state, more than twice as many as in 1980.
Thank you, Geoff from AussieBushTrek, for e-mailing this.
In the public arena, almost no one connects these plainly visible dots.
For various reasons, linking the world's rapid population growth to its deepening environmental crisis, including climate change, is politically taboo. In the United States, Europe and Japan, there has been public hand-wringing over falling birthrates and government policies to encourage child-bearing.
But those declining birthrates mask explosive growth elsewhere in the world.
In less than a lifetime, the world population has tripled, to 7.1 billion, and continues to climb by more than 1.5 million people a week.
A consensus statement issued in May by scientists at Stanford University and signed by more than 1,000 scientists warned that "Earth is reaching a tipping point."
An array of events under way - including what scientists have identified as the sixth mass extinction in the earth's 540 million-year history - suggest that human activity already exceeds earth's capacity.
Climate change is but one of many signs of environmental stress. "The big connector is how many people are on earth," said Anthony Barnosky, a UC Berkeley integrative biologist.
The world population is expected to reach 9.6 billion by mid-century. The addition will be greater than the global population of 1950.
The United States is expected to grow from 313 million people to 400 million. Economies have expanded many times faster, vastly increasing consumption of goods and services in rich and developing countries.
"The combination of climate change and 9 billion people to me is one that is just fraught with potential catastrophes," said John Harte, a UC Berkeley ecosystem scientist.
"The evidence that humans are damaging their ecological life-support system is overwhelming," said the report by the Millennium Alliance for Humanity and the Biosphere at Stanford. "By the time today's children reach middle age, it is extremely likely that the Earth's life-support systems, critical for human prosperity and existence, will be irretrievably damaged."
California Gov. Jerry Brown had the report translated into Chinese and delivered it to Chinese President Xi Jinping in June.
A new epoch?
So complete is human domination of earth that scientists use the term "Anthropocene" to describe a new geological epoch.
The most obvious sign is climate change. People have altered the composition of the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels. But other human impacts, widely discussed by scientists, seldom reach the political arena.
Residues from 100 million tons of synthetic chemical compounds produced each year are so pervasive that they commonly appear in polar bear tissues, whale blubber and the umbilical cords of babies.
Each year, humans appropriate up to 40 percent of the earth's biomass, the product of photosynthesis, earth's basic energy conversion necessary to all life.
Humans have converted more than 40 percent of the earth's land to cities or farms. Roads and structures fragment most of the rest.
Humans appropriate more than half the world's fresh water. Ancient aquifers in the world's bread baskets, including the Ogallala in the Great Plains, are being drained.
Only 2 percent of major U.S. rivers run unimpeded. California's Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta has been entirely re-engineered. The last time the Colorado River reached the Sea of Cortez was in 1998. The Nile, Indus and Ganges rivers have been reduced to a trickle.
Humans surpass nature as a source of nitrogen emissions, altering the planet's nitrogen cycle.
Footnote[s]
#fnSubj1" id="fnSubj1">1. #txtSubj1">↑ In truth, whilst the facts and statistics in the rest of the article are of great concern, 725 tonnes of waste being washed up onto the approximately 1,200 km coastline of California in 12 months seems far from excessive. Could this be a mistake or some sort of typographical error? - Ed
To help overcome public opposition to U.S. President Barack Obama's planned conventional war against Syria, the mainstream media, as well as fabricating lies such as the claims of the use of Chemical weapons by the Syrian Government, is concealing news of how members of the Christian community of Syria are being murdered by the Western-supported jihadist 'rebels' who are fighting to overthrow the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad. Many of the Syrian Christian community can trace their family roots back to the time of Jesus, In this embedded speech, just posted to YouTube, British Parliamentarian, GeorgeGalloway shows up U.S. President Barack and other Western leaders, who claim to be Christian, for the despicable lying hypocrites that they are.
Transcript of George Galloway's Speech
You know that stinking hypocrite Obama is frequently seen in churches. Have you seen him, creeping Jesus with these hands together praying? Did you see Christianity on his sleeve? Did you know that he used to attend churches in Chicago and sing along all happy, clappy for Jesus and for God? Obama, the Syrian Christian town of Maaloula is on fire this evening! This evening, its ancient Christian churches are on fire! Its priests and its parishioners are being butchered by al-Qaeda paid by you! Churches in which the language of Jesus himself is still spoken. The last Churches in the world still speaking Aramaic, the language of Jesus, are now on fire.
The faithful Christians fleeing for their lives and being murdered by al-Qaeda paid for by you, and you are about to become their Air Force. You're a disgusting hypocrite, Obama. You're a liar when you say you're a Christian. You care nothing about Christians. You care nothing about God! You don't believe in the prophets. Peace be upon them. You just believe in the profits and how to get a bigger piece of them.
for the people that back to ... (continuity lost?) .. Westminster Abbey, or you see that disgusting hypocrite, Obama -- happy clapping in Christian churches in the United States.
Remember this: that the Christians of Syria are being murdered and massacred by al-Qaeda paid for and armed by Britain and the United States and France and the other hypocrite so-called Christian leaderships in the world.
May god preserve Maaloula. May god save as many Christians as can be saved from the inferno which has been launched against them. Its a beautiful village. I've been there. The monastery there is one of the most serene places on the earth. Actually the best place in the Arab world to be a Christian is Syria! But these hypocrites in the so-called Christian West don't give a toss about that.
As I said, their leaders care nothing about the prophets -- peace be upon them -- everything about the profits and how to get a bigger piece of them.
Almost everyone pays directly through taxes to be lied to by the ABC and SBS news services (and the British pay with their taxes, for much of the rest of the world as well as themselves, to be misinformed by the BBC news service). Some pay through direct purchaseorsubscription to be misinformed. Few who watch commercial television news services don't pay indirectly to be lied to. They pay additional costs added to the prices of their purchases to pay for advertising.
One of the almost countless examples of lies about Syria in the Melbourne Age and other Australian newsmedia is the editorial A surprise outbreak of diplomacy over Syria of 11 September 2013 (emphasis added):
At last, Russia ... might appease the United States over Dr Assad's despicable actions in gassing Syrian civilians last month. ... Russia's call [to have Syria's chemical weapons destroyed under international control ...
... would ... remove the immediate justification for US military action against the Assad regime.
... There is too much at stake for the region, and for the Syrian people in particular, to let this ruthless dictator off easily. Ultimately, Dr Assad must be brought to justice to answer for this crime.
The evidence emerging, now that the U.S. has stalled its war plans, is that the terrorist opponents of the popularly supported Syrian government, supplied by the United States' ally Saudi Arabia, launched thechemical weapons. Special UN investigator Carla del Ponte had in April found that it was more likely that Syrian rebels and not the Syrian government had used chemical weapons. Subsequent investigations by Russian chemical weapons experts confirmed Carla del Ponte's findings.
The United States, has itself repeatedly used chemical weapons and other WMDs in the numerous wars it has fought since the middle of the twentieth century. Given that Syria has also faced the threat of nuclear attack from Israel since the 1960's, it would seem prudent for Syria to have possessed one means to deter the Israeli government from launching those weapons agains Syria.
It is not Syrian President al-Assad that needs to be held to account, but the Age newspaper and its editors for lying to their readers about Syria.
The corporate criminals, their government glove-puppets and their newsmedia outlets have vast resources to pay their journalists and editors to misinform the public about world critical events like the Syrian conflict.
Much has been achieved in recent years to counter such lies thanks to the great levelling effect of the (still) free Internet journalists and researchers who have made their work freely available to Internet users.
However, if this is to continue, we cannot continue to rely upon unpaid volunteers or others, with paid employment, working late into the night or on weekends. Those who produce informative Internet content are entitled to remuneration for their valuable work.
Virtually all the independent Internet news services are struggling to make ends meet. These include the Boiling Frogs Post web-site of FBI whistleblower Sybil Edmonds. An appeal for more funds is appended below.
Other Independent news services that also need financial support include GlobalResearch and Paul CraigRoberts. (Curiously, I wan't able to find any appeal for financial support on three other immensely valuable web-sites, Voltaire Net, the Land Destroyer Report and the Corbett Report, but we should be ready to help them out should they suddenly face unexpected financial difficulty in future.) (Candobetter, which is currently also produced by volunteers giving their time for free, could also use professional staff who are able to work full time.)
Below is the appeal for funds from Boiling Frogs Post:
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Dr. Ian Jenkins of Arian Cymru (Money Wales) has written two excellent articles on why Wales should have its own bank and how that might be accomplished. The shorter article is reprinted below, and the longer, more technical article is linked here.
Dr. Jenkins is hosting an event in Cardiff on September 26th titled "Banking and Economic Regeneration Wales," at which Marc Armstrong, executive director of the Public Banking Institute, will be speaking, along with Ann Pettifor of the New Economics Foundation and several Welsh leaders. As Dr. Jensen states:
This is in an issue on which Wales could provide leadership on an EU-wide level, a matter in which a small nation could make a big difference.
That is also true for Ireland and Scotland, where interest in public banking is growing. I will be speaking on that subject at a series of seminars in Ireland on October 12th-15th (details here), and I spoke late last year in Scotland on the same subject (see my earlier article here).
Here is Dr. Jenkins' perceptive piece, which applies as well to Ireland and Scotland.
Public Banking for Wales: Escaping the Extractive Model
The economic history of the past 30 years has been, by and large, that of an uncontrolled expansion of the financial sector at the direct expense of the so called 'real' economy' of manufacturing and production. This expansion has been brought about by the hegemony of the free-market doctrines, based principally on fundamentally ideological beliefs in deregulation and privatisation, which have become known as 'neo-Liberal' or 'neo-Classical' economics.
As former US bank regulator William K. Black put it, 'In the world we live in, finance has become the dog instead of the tail [...] They have become a parasite'. The private banks have established themselves in this position through the control of the primary mechanism by which money is created within our system: the issuing of credit. In this paper I will aim to briefly outline how this credit function could be redirected from speculation and bubble creation, which constitute the dominant directions of credit issuance under private banking, towards more stable and sustainable areas which would serve the public interest instead of those of shareholders and bank CEOs. This is not a theoretical method, but rather one which throughout the post-WW II period saw the German Landesbanken facilitate the growth of the mittelstand sector of Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs), as well as in the present day constituting the means by which the state-owned Bank of North Dakota (BND) contributes significantly to North Dakota being the only US State to run a budget surplus throughout the post-2008 crisis.
In order for a productive economy to exist there must be adequate streams of affordable credit and it is the absence of such constructive investment which, I would submit, has been a vital contributing factor to the decline of the Welsh economy, and indeed that of the UK, in the past 30 years. Before continuing with this analysis it is worth briefly examining the current banking system and the effect of its operations on the real economy, in Wales as elsewhere.
Banking Now: The Extractive Model of Credit Creation
'What is money and where does it come from?' are, remarkably, questions rarely asked in mainstream economics and even less so by members of the public; yet the answers to these two questions hold one of the keys to understanding the (mal)functioning of our economic system and for devising a new, more democratic direction. As the great American economist G.K. Galbraith observed in his fascinating study of the history of banking Money: Whence It Came, Where It Went, 'The study of money, above all other fields in economics, is the one in which complexity is used to disguise truth or to evade truth, not to reveal it' (Galbraith: 1975, p.1), stating later in the same text that, 'The process by which banks create money is so simple that the mind is repelled' (Galbraith: 1975, p.18). So what is money? The instinctive answer to this question for most people is that money is the physical notes and coins produced by the government; they may even go on to say that this money is produced at the Royal Mint at Llantrisant, ironically making this physical money one of an increasingly diminishing range of Welsh exports. Yet physical money of this sort, in the form of notes and coins, only accounts for approximately 3% of money in circulation. This version of money is indeed the product of government, as under the Bank Charter Act 1844 the power to create banknotes (and coins) became the exclusive preserve of the Bank of England, a power exercised in agreement with Westminster. Since the so-called 'Nixon shock' of 1971 ended the existing Bretton Woods system of international financial exchange by unilaterally cancelling the direct convertibility of the United States dollar to gold the banknotes of the Bank of England/UK government have been essentially what is known as a 'fiat' or 'soft' currency; that is, a monetary unit which is not backed by any 'hard' commodity such as gold and, consequently, is limited in quantity only by the inflationary consequences of overproduction.
So what accounts for the other 97% of money in circulation? To answer this question it is necessary to understand the nature of credit issuance through fractional reserve banking, which is neatly encapsulated by the Statement of Martin Wolf that, 'The essence of the contemporary monetary system is the creation of money, out of nothing, by private banks' often foolish lending' (Wolf: 2010)[i]. This process is profoundly counter-intuitive to most members of the public who would assume that banks lend the deposits they receive, but this is not the case at all: the money issued through the process of creating a loan is created out of nothing, subject only to the rules for capital reserves contained in the Basel Accords. Two publications produced by the Bank of England make the current mechanism of money creation clear:
By far the largest role in creating broad money is played by the banking sector [...] When banks make loans they create additional deposits for those that have borrowed the money. (Bank of England: 2007, p.377)
The second publication, a transcript of speech in 2007 by Paul Tucker the Executive Director (Markets) for the Bank of England and a Member of the Monetary Policy Committee also states that:
Subject only but crucially to confidence in their soundness, banks extend credit by simply increasing the borrowing customer's current account [...] That is, banks extend credit by creating money.
The current system is a product of the fact that the Bank Charter Act 1844 prohibited banks from printing banknotes, but did not prohibit the issuing of money by ledger entry through the making of loans: with the advent of electronic systems in the past thirty years this facility to 'print money' by making entries into borrowers accounts with the stroke of a keypad has expanded significantly. Currently, then, there is a system in place whereby the power of money creation is largely in the hands of private corporations who are able to make sizeable profits through the levying of interest for their performance of this function. This system also leaves the private banks with the decision as to which sectors of the economy should be afforded lines of credit, and in the past thirty years this has moved increasingly away from the productive 'real economy' and towards speculation and bubble creation: with the results we now experience. Part of the deposit base of private banks is the income of local and national government and this leads to a situation wherein private corporations use public money as a deposit base for speculation and lending for speculation (See Fig.1).
The Idea of a State Bank: Re-investment of Interest from Productive Credit Provision
The best current example of a functioning state bank is that of the Bank of North Dakota (BND) in the United States. The way in which the bank functions is best described in its own words:
The deposit base of BND is unique. Its primary deposit base is the State of North Dakota. All state funds and funds of state institutions are deposited with Bank of North Dakota, as required by law. Other deposits are accepted from any source, private citizens to the U.S. government.
This framework provides the state of North Dakota with what is most needed for a local economy to thrive: affordable (and available) credit for SMEs and resources for the improvement of infrastructure. Under the state banking model the benefit derived from the interest accrued in the credit-issuing process is returned to the state and can be re-invested or spent in accordance with the public interest, instead of being paid to shareholders in dividends or given away in absurd bonuses to bankers who merely carry out a largely mechanical function, however subject to mystification and obfuscation: with myopic incompetence in many cases in the last thirty years (See Fig.2).
In the case of North Dakota this has resulted in the state being the only US state to run a budget surplus throughout the financial crisis post-2008 and this must make their model at least worth considering in a Welsh context.
The Report of the Silk Commission 2012
In Part 1 of its remit The Silk Commission was asked to consider the National Assembly for Wales's current financial powers in relation to taxation and borrowing and its report was produced in November 2012. The commission concluded that the Welsh Assembly government should be granted borrowing powers, basing this conclusion partly on 'international evidence' drawn from a single World Bank publication from 1999: making this 'evidence' neither ideologically neutral, being the product of an organisation which is the éminence grise of global neo-liberalism, nor current, with many of its conclusions being weighed and found wanting by the post-2008 financial crisis. The findings of the commission contains no consideration whatsoever of the role of banks in money creation through credit issuance, and the attendant problems of misallocation of investment, and no investigation of the success of public banking in the international context, for instance in the BRIC economies, or of the potential role of public banking in Wales. For this reason I feel that it is important that these issues be brought into the debate on the Welsh economy, as to ignore it would be to exclude a potentially democratising and sustainable banking system from the national conversation and would merely make any granting of borrowing powers to the Welsh Assembly Government nothing more than a new stream of income for the private banking system. If all that 'responsibility' means in the fiscal context is for Wales as a political unit to submit itself to the 'discipline' of the bond markets, then this is indeed a very sorry direction in which the politicians of the Welsh Assembly are taking both their current constituents, and those yet to be born.
Conclusion
There is a widely perceived need for change to the economic system today and especially for reform of the way in which banking operates, with the majority of the population feeling, rightly, that there is 'something wrong' with the way in which the economy, and particularly banking, currently functions. I believe that a public bank, properly instituted with all due diligence and care for regulation and democratic supervision, can provide one of the possible directions of sustainable change which is so needed in Wales and beyond. The model suggested by the Welsh Conservatives, as it stands, would be no substitute for a real public bank: a bank which would recoup its profits, gleaned from interest on productive loans to the real economy, for the good of the people of Wales. A true Welsh public bank would be in a position to reinvest its profits in socially beneficial areas like education, infrastructure and the health service, instead of funding bonuses and maximising shareholder dividends for a privileged few in the increasingly rarefied world of finance.
______________________________
Bibliography
Ahmad, J (1999) 'Decentralising borrowing powers' World Bank
Brown, Ellen, Web of Debt (Baton Rouge: Third Millenium Press, 2012); The Public Bank Solution (Baton Rouge: Third Millenium Press, 2013).
Commission on Devolution in Wales (Silk Commission) (2012) 'Empowerment and Responsibility: Financial Powers to Strengthen Wales' (full report at: http://commissionondevolutioninwales.independent.gov.uk/)
Tucker, P. (2008). 'Money and Credit: Banking and the macro-economy', speech given at the monetary policy and markets conference, 13 December 2007, Bank of England Quarterly Bulletin 2008, Q1, pp. 96–106. Available at: http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/publications/speeches/2007/speech331.pdf (not there on 12 Sep 2013)
Welsh Conservatives, A Vision for Welsh Investment (January 2013) Available at: http://yourvoiceintheassembly.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/Invest-Wales-FINAL.pdf
[i] Wolf, Martin, 'The Fed is right to turn on the tap', The Financial Times, 9/3/2010
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, whose pronouncements on Syria have featured on candobetter.net recently, has authored today's editorial opinion for the New York Times, calling on the US not to invade Syria. Full text reproduced here.
A Plea for Caution From Russia
What Putin Has to Say to Americans About Syria
By VLADIMIR V. PUTIN
Published: September 11, 2013 in the New York Times
MOSCOW — "RECENT events surrounding Syria have prompted me to speak directly to the American people and their political leaders. It is important to do so at a time of insufficient communication between our societies.
Relations between us have passed through different stages. We stood against each other during the cold war. But we were also allies once, and defeated the Nazis together. The universal international organization — the United Nations — was then established to prevent such devastation from ever happening again.
The United Nations’ founders understood that decisions affecting war and peace should happen only by consensus, and with America’s consent the veto by Security Council permanent members was enshrined in the United Nations Charter. The profound wisdom of this has underpinned the stability of international relations for decades.
No one wants the United Nations to suffer the fate of the League of Nations, which collapsed because it lacked real leverage. This is possible if influential countries bypass the United Nations and take military action without Security Council authorization.
The potential strike by the United States against Syria, despite strong opposition from many countries and major political and religious leaders, including the pope, will result in more innocent victims and escalation, potentially spreading the conflict far beyond Syria’s borders. A strike would increase violence and unleash a new wave of terrorism. It could undermine multilateral efforts to resolve the Iranian nuclear problem and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and further destabilize the Middle East and North Africa. It could throw the entire system of international law and order out of balance.
Syria is not witnessing a battle for democracy, but an armed conflict between government and opposition in a multireligious country. There are few champions of democracy in Syria. But there are more than enough Qaeda fighters and extremists of all stripes battling the government. The United States State Department has designated Al Nusra Front and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, fighting with the opposition, as terrorist organizations. This internal conflict, fueled by foreign weapons supplied to the opposition, is one of the bloodiest in the world.
Mercenaries from Arab countries fighting there, and hundreds of militants from Western countries and even Russia, are an issue of our deep concern. Might they not return to our countries with experience acquired in Syria? After all, after fighting in Libya, extremists moved on to Mali. This threatens us all.
From the outset, Russia has advocated peaceful dialogue enabling Syrians to develop a compromise plan for their own future. We are not protecting the Syrian government, but international law. We need to use the United Nations Security Council and believe that preserving law and order in today’s complex and turbulent world is one of the few ways to keep international relations from sliding into chaos. The law is still the law, and we must follow it whether we like it or not. Under current international law, force is permitted only in self-defense or by the decision of the Security Council. Anything else is unacceptable under the United Nations Charter and would constitute an act of aggression.
No one doubts that poison gas was used in Syria. But there is every reason to believe it was used not by the Syrian Army, but by opposition forces, to provoke intervention by their powerful foreign patrons, who would be siding with the fundamentalists. Reports that militants are preparing another attack — this time against Israel — cannot be ignored.
It is alarming that military intervention in internal conflicts in foreign countries has become commonplace for the United States. Is it in America’s long-term interest? I doubt it. Millions around the world increasingly see America not as a model of democracy but as relying solely on brute force, cobbling coalitions together under the slogan “you’re either with us or against us.”
But force has proved ineffective and pointless. Afghanistan is reeling, and no one can say what will happen after international forces withdraw. Libya is divided into tribes and clans. In Iraq the civil war continues, with dozens killed each day. In the United States, many draw an analogy between Iraq and Syria, and ask why their government would want to repeat recent mistakes.
No matter how targeted the strikes or how sophisticated the weapons, civilian casualties are inevitable, including the elderly and children, whom the strikes are meant to protect.
The world reacts by asking: if you cannot count on international law, then you must find other ways to ensure your security. Thus a growing number of countries seek to acquire weapons of mass destruction. This is logical: if you have the bomb, no one will touch you. We are left with talk of the need to strengthen nonproliferation, when in reality this is being eroded.
We must stop using the language of force and return to the path of civilized diplomatic and political settlement.
A new opportunity to avoid military action has emerged in the past few days. The United States, Russia and all members of the international community must take advantage of the Syrian government’s willingness to place its chemical arsenal under international control for subsequent destruction. Judging by the statements of President Obama, the United States sees this as an alternative to military action.
I welcome the president’s interest in continuing the dialogue with Russia on Syria. We must work together to keep this hope alive, as we agreed to at the Group of 8 meeting in Lough Erne in Northern Ireland in June, and steer the discussion back toward negotiations.
If we can avoid force against Syria, this will improve the atmosphere in international affairs and strengthen mutual trust. It will be our shared success and open the door to cooperation on other critical issues.
My working and personal relationship with President Obama is marked by growing trust. I appreciate this. I carefully studied his address to the nation on Tuesday. And I would rather disagree with a case he made on American exceptionalism, stating that the United States’ policy is “what makes America different. It’s what makes us exceptional.” It is extremely dangerous to encourage people to see themselves as exceptional, whatever the motivation. There are big countries and small countries, rich and poor, those with long democratic traditions and those still finding their way to democracy. Their policies differ, too. We are all different, but when we ask for the Lord’s blessings, we must not forget that God created us equal."
Vladimir V. Putin is the president of Russia.
Originally published on the New York Times site, where you can also read over 500 comments (at time of this report - 2135hrs 12/9/2013 Melbourne time)."
It should be an exciting day, so I hope you all can make it!
There has also been the suggestion of perhaps doing an informal hacking day to celebrate GNU's 30th birthday. Stay tuned to the free-software-melb mailing list if this interests you, and feel free to suggest a venue if anyone has any ideas.
We're a group who meet monthly to discuss free software and related issues. Our aims are to:
- Connect people interested in free software issues
- Share knowledge and experience, eg. understanding free software licensing
- Support and encourage free software advocacy
- Work together on solving issues local to Australia, eg. that software by the Australian Tax Office is proprietary
We're non-technical and fill a niche that complements more technical GNU/Linux user groups like the Linux Users of Victoria or the Melbourne Linux Users Group.
Join our mailing lists
Join our announcement list (archives) to hear about upcoming meetings and events. Join our discussion list (archives) to hear from and talk to other members of the free software community.
Attend our monthly discussion group
Each month (third Thursday), we meet to discuss one or more free software issues. It is a relaxed "sit around and chat" type event. No prior knowledge is expected.
VPAC Head Office Training Room
Level 1, Building 91, 110 Victoria Street
Carlton South
Mr Thomson received the strongest two-party vote of any Labor candidate in Australia in Labor's disaster 2013 election results. Inside a you-tube interview with Kelvin Thomson where he talks freely about what went wrong in recent government (among other things - seeking a 'messiah') and says that he will not recontest the front bench because he does not want to be muzzled (editorial word) from commenting on the massive issues of our times - species extinction, ecology, war, overpopulation, democracy ... Kelvin Thomson is known for his democratic consultation of his electorate and his reflection of their concerns. He is widely in touch with Australians everywhere and responsive to their issues of ecology, democracy, and population. Politicians everywhere should take note. Mr Thomson did not have to rely on pleasing Mr Murdoch, but Mr Murdoch still likes to report him because he makes too much sense and is too democratically influential to ignore.
Statement on Labor Frontbench, Labor's Future, Leadership, Policy & Wills Electorate
Thank you to the Wills Electorate
http://www.youtube.com/embed/5dqL5ErigKw?feature=player_detailpage
First I want to say a heartfelt thank you to the people of Wills, and to my campaign team, who have given me wonderful support throughout this election campaign, and indeed the months and years leading up to it. The Electoral Commission figures reported in this morning’s newspapers show that I have the strongest two-party preferred vote of any Labor candidate in Australia. These outcomes can change of course depending on final vote counting and preference distribution, but it is a great honour to have such a strong level of support, and I am determined to work hard in the next Parliament to be a vigorous and forceful advocate and representative of the people of Wills.
Labor Frontbench
As I told my campaign team on Saturday night, I will not be a candidate for the Opposition frontbench. I was a Shadow Minister for 10 years prior to 2007. I have been there and done that. It is my experience that being a Shadow Minister brings with it obligations not to speak outside your portfolio, and to have everything you do say cleared and approved by the Leader of the Opposition’s office. For me these limitations are simply too great in a world and an Australia which I believe is facing massive challenges.
The world is being damaged, perhaps irreparably by rapid population growth, climate change, unchecked rainforest and other habitat destruction, poverty, war and terrorism. Australia is not immune from these challenges. Many of our unique and beautiful birds, plants and animals, are on the brink of extinction. Our young people can’t afford to buy a home of their own, and their jobs are insecure, while pensioners and retirees battle rapidly rising electricity, gas and water bills and council rates.
I need to be able to speak out about these things, and I intend to. Anyone who thinks my decision to return to the backbench means that I am looking to lead a quiet life and slip out the back door is very mistaken. On the contrary, it is a necessary pre-condition for being active in the debate about the issues which are of greatest importance to the world and this country.
Labor’s Future
Labor’s election loss was not a function of poor economic management. We delivered low inflation, low unemployment, low interest rates, a triple A credit rating, and low public sector debt. We are the envy of other countries right around the world. It was a function of poor political management.
There are two key aspects of this- leadership and policy.
Leadership
Over the years we have seen a steady, relentless drift of power away from the electorate, away from political party members, away from Members of Parliament, away from Ministers and Shadow Ministers, towards Party Leaders.
This is fundamentally undemocratic. Ordinary voters have plenty of opportunities to catch up with me and other Members of Parliament and make their views known to us. They have no hope of accessing Prime Ministers and Premiers.
And the trend to leave everything to a Messiah leads to poor decisions which have been made by a small group of people, and not submitted to proper scrutiny. On the floor of the Victorian Parliament is written “Where no counsel is the people fail, but in the multitude of counsellors there is wisdom”.
In the last Parliament there were numerous botched policy announcements which had not been subjected to scrutiny by the Parliamentary Labor Party, certainly not scrutiny by Labor Party Branch members and the electorate, and in some cases not even by Ministers.
My advice to the next Leader of the Parliamentary Labor Party is twofold:-
1) Do less. Avoid the trap of the 24/7 media cycle, and don’t try to do everything. Don’t suffocate your Ministerial and Parliamentary colleagues by constantly dominating the airwaves. Giving them more say means giving voters more say. It also gives you more time to see that decisions are properly implemented, and helps save you from the trap of trying to do too much. We don’t need to announce something everyday; what we need to do is to get right the things we do announce.
2) Give the Parliamentary Party, and the voters, some real power, by taking proposals there first, AND leaving them for consideration at the next meeting. Many decisions are announced without consulting the Caucus at all, while others are presented as a fait accompli to a Caucus Meeting. MPs have no opportunity to consult with their constituents or interested parties about the proposal. It would be far more democratic, and lead to far fewer stuff-ups, if proposals were taken to the Parliamentary Party and left there for proper consideration.
Party Branches and Policy Committees are largely moribund, and Party Conferences and the Caucus have been acting as a rubber stamp. The leadership needs to stop taking and announcing decisions without consulting them, and thereby resuscitate and breathe life into them.
Policy
We need our policies to be in touch with the views of voters. I am all in favour of us being a middle of the road party, but some in our party interpret middle of the road as doing what big business wants. I believe being middle of the road is doing what voters want.
If we did what voters want, on issues like population growth, migration, planning, foreign ownership, live animal export, rather than what big business wants, we would do a lot better.
For more than two years, Syrian President Bashar al-Assad has been demonised by the Western presstitute newsmedia as a brutal dictator, a mass murderer, corrupt and, most recently, a chemical war criminal.
Unlike the serial liars Barack Obama and John Kerry, who have yet to face real questioning by the western 'journalists', Syrian President President Bashar al-Assad, for a brutal and corrupt dictator, has shown himself remarkably willing and able to face critical and probing interviews.
On 3 September 2013, he was interviewed by the French daily Le Figaro. On 6 Jun , he was interviewed by the German Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper. On 5 April 2013, he was interviewed by a Turkish television station. On 23 February, he was interviewed by a German television station. In all of these interviews, the claims made against his government were put to him and he was able to convincingly refute them. It is hard to conceive of how President al-Assad could have appeared so calm and credible if there were any factual basis to the allegations made against him.
On 9 September 2013, as the United States was preparing to strike Syria, President Assad was interviewed by Charlie Rose of CBS News, a station which has been presenting lying propaganda as news about the Syrian conflict. Although not a native English Speaker, President al-Assad, calmly and clearly put his case and answered the unsubstantiated claims aginst his government including the claim that his government had used poison gas against Syrian civilians.
CBS News Presenter
CBS Interview Charlie Rose
President Bashar al-Assad calmly putting his case and refuting mainstream media lies.
CBS commentator, who labeled President al-Assad's words 'propaganda'.
Following the interview, viewers were dissuaded from forming their own judgment, when President al-Assad's words were labeled 'propaganda'.
During the interview President al-Assad neither confirmed nor denied that Syria had chemical weapons. He pointed out that Israel, from which his country had faced invasion on a number of occasions, as well as Syria, was not a signatory to the Chemical Weapons Non-Proliferation Treaty. Nevertheless, his government wished to see chemical weapons abolished and had taken initiatives to ensure that they were. This was brushed aside after the interview concluded, when one female commentator asserted that "Syria has a very large stockpiles of chemical weapons according to multiple intelligence communities around the world."
#part1_3455" id="part1_3455">Part 1 (29:27) of the full CBS Interview
Update, 15 August 2015: The full video of length 56:28 minutes can be watched here on YouTube in place of #part1_3455">Part 1 and #part2_3455">Part 2 on this page. - Ed
Charlie Rose: Mr. President thank you very much for this opportunity to talk to you at a very important moment because the President of the United States will address the nation this week and, as you know an important conversation is taking place in Washington and important things are happening here in your country. Do you expect an airstrike?
President al-Assad:As long as the United States doesn't obey the international law and trample over the Charter of the United Nations we have to worry that any administration -- not only this one -- would do anything. According to the lies that we've been hearing for the last two weeks from high-ranking officials in the US administration we have to expect the worst.
Charlie Rose: Are you prepared?
President al-Assad: We've been living in difficult circumstances for the last two years and a half, and we prepare ourselves for every possibility. But that doesn't mean if you're prepared things will be better; it's going to get worse with any foolish strike or stupid war.
Charlie Rose: What do you mean worse?
President al-Assad: Worse because of the repercussions because nobody can tell you the repercussions of the first strike. We're talking about one region, bigger regions, not only about Syria. This interlinked region, this intermingled, interlocked, whatever you want to call it; if you strike somewhere, you have to expect the repercussions somewhere else in different forms in ways you don't expect.
Charlie Rose: Are you suggesting that if in fact there is a strike; there will be repercussions against the United States from your friends in other countries like Iran or Hezbollah or others?
President al-Assad: As I said, this may take different forms: direct and indirect. Direct when people want to retaliate, or governments. Indirect when you're going to have instability and the spread of terrorism all over the region that will influence the west directly.
Charlie Rose: Have you had conversations with Russia, with Iran or with Hezbollah about how to retaliate?
President al-Assad: We don't discuss this issue as a government, but we discuss the repercussions, which is more important because sometimes repercussions could be more destroying than the strike itself. Any American strike will not destroy as much as the terrorists have already destroyed in Syria; sometimes the repercussions could be many doubles the strike itself.
Charlie Rose: But some have suggested that it might tip the balance in the favor of the rebels and lead to the overthrow of your government.
Any strike will be as direct support to Al-Qaeda
President al-Assad: Exactly. Any strike will be as direct support to Al-Qaeda offshoot that's called Jabhat al-Nusra and the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. You're right about this. It's going to be direct support.
Charlie Rose: This is about chemical warfare. Let's talk about that. Do you approve of the use of chemical warfare, the use of deadly chemicals? Do you think that it is an appropriate tool of war, to use chemicals?
President al-Assad: We are against any WMD, any weapons of mass destruction, whether chemical or nuclear.
Charlie Rose: So you're against the use of chemical warfare?
20130910-065004.jpg
President al-Assad:Yes, not only me. As a state, as a government, in 2001 we proposed to the United Nations to empty or to get rid of every WMD in the Middle East, and the United States stood against that proposal. This is our conviction and policy.
Charlie Rose: But you're not a signatory to the chemical warfare agreement.
President al-Assad: Not yet.
Charlie Rose: Why not?
President al-Assad: Because Israel has WMD, and it has to sign, and Israel is occupying our land, so that's we talked about the Middle East, not Syria, not Israel; it should be comprehensive.
Charlie Rose: Do you consider chemical warfare equivalent to nuclear warfare?
President al-Assad: I don't know. We haven't tried either.
Charlie Rose: But you know, you're a head of state, and you understand the consequences of weapons that don't discriminate.
President al-Assad: Technically, they're not the same. But morally, it's the same.
Charlie Rose: Morally, they are the same.
President al-Assad: They are the same, but at the end, killing is killing. Massacring is massacring. Sometimes you may kill tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands with very primitive armaments.
Charlie Rose: Then why do you have such a stockpile of chemical weapons?
President al-Assad: We don't discuss this issue in public because we never said that we have it, and we never said that we don't have it. It's a Syrian issue; it's a military issue we never discuss in public with anyone.
Charlie Rose: This is from the New York Times this morning: Syria's leaders amassed one of the world's largest stockpiles of chemical weapons with help from the Soviet Union and Iran as well as Western European suppliers, and even a handful of American companies. According to American diplomatic cables and declassified intelligence records, you have amassed one of the largest supplies of chemical weapons in the world.
President al-Assad: To have or not to have is a possibility, but to depend on what media says is nonsense, or to depend on some of the reports of the intelligence is nonsense and that was proven when they invaded Iraq ten years ago and they said "Iraq has stockpiles of WMD" and it was proven after the invasion that this was false; it was fraud. So, we can't depend on what one magazine wrote. But at the end, I said it's something not to be discussed with anyone.
Charlie Rose: You accept that the world believes that you have a stockpile of chemical weapons?
President al-Assad: Who?
Charlie Rose: The world. The United States and other powers who also said that you have chemical weapons.
President al-Assad: It isn't about what they believe in, it's about the reality that we have, and this reality, we own it, we don't have to discuss it.
Charlie Rose: Speaking of reality, what was the reality on August 21st? What happened in your judgment?
President al-Assad: We're not in the area where the alleged chemical attack happened. I said alleged. We're not sure that anything happened.
Charlie Rose: Even at this date, you're not sure that chemical weapons -- even though you have seen the video tape, even though you've seen the bodies, even though your own officials have been there.
President al-Assad: I haven't finished. Our soldiers in another area were attacked chemically. Our soldiers - they went to the hospital as casualties because of chemical weapons, but in the area where they said the government used chemical weapons, we only had video and we only have pictures and allegations. We're not there; our forces, our police, our institutions don't exist there. How can you talk about what happened if you don't have evidence? We're not like the American administration, we're not social media administration or government. We are a government that deals with reality. When we have evidence, we'll announce it.
Charlie Rose: Well, as you know, Secretary Kerry has said there is evidence and that they saw rockets that fired from a region controlled by your forces into a region controlled by the rebels. They have evidence from satellite photographs of that. They have evidence of a message that was intercepted about chemical weapons, and soon thereafter there were other intercepted messages, so Secretary Kerry has presented what he views as conclusive evidence.
Kerry reminds about the big lie that Collin Powell said in front of the world on satellites about the WMD in Iraq
President al-Assad:No, he presented his confidence and his convictions. It's not about confidence, it's about evidence. The Russians have completely opposite evidence that the missiles were thrown from an area where the rebels control. This reminds me - what Kerry said - about the big lie that Collin Powell said in front of the world on satellites about the WMD in Iraq before going to war. He said "this is our evidence." Actually, he gave false evidence. In this case, Kerry didn't even present any evidence. He talked "we have evidence" and he didn't present anything. Not yet, nothing so far; not a single shred of evidence.
Charlie Rose: Do you have some remorse for those bodies, those people, it is said to be up to at least a thousand or perhaps 1400, who were in Eastern Ghouta, who died?
President al-Assad: We feel pain for every Syrian victim.
Charlie Rose: What about the victims of this assault from chemical warfare?
President al-Assad: Dead is dead, killing is killing, crime is crime. When you feel pain, you feel pain about their family, about the loss that you have in your country, whether one person was killed or a hundred or a thousand. It's a loss, it's a crime, it's a moral issue. We have family that we sit with, family that loved their dear ones. It's not about how they are killed, it's about that they are dead now; this is the bad thing.
Charlie Rose: But has there been any remorse or sadness on behalf of the Syrian people for what happened?
President al-Assad:I think sadness prevails in Syria now. We don't feel anything else but sadness because we have this killing every day, whether with chemical or any other kind. It's not about how. We feel with it every day.
Charlie Rose: But this was indiscriminate, and children were killed, and people who said goodbye to their children in the morning didn't see them and will never see them again, in Ghouta.
President al-Assad:That is the case every day in Syria, that's why you have to stop the killing. That's why we have to stop the killing. But what do you mean by "indiscriminate" that you are talking about?
Charlie Rose: Well, the fact that chemical warfare is indiscriminate in who it kills, innocents as well as combatants.
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President al-Assad: Yeah, but you're not talking about evidence, you're not talking about facts, we are talking about allegations. So, we're not sure that if there's chemical weapon used and who used it. We can't talk about virtual things, we have to talk about facts.
Charlie Rose: It is said that your government delayed the United Nations observers from getting to Ghouta and that you denied and delayed the Red Cross then the Red Crescent from getting there to make observations and to help.
President al-Assad:The opposite happened, your government delayed because we asked for a delegation in March 2013 when the first attack happened in Aleppo in the north of Syria; they delayed it till just a few days before al-Ghouta when they sent those team, and the team itself said in its report that he did everything as he wanted. There was not a single obstacle.
Charlie Rose: But they said they were delayed in getting there, that they wanted to be there earlier.
President al-Assad: No, no, no; there was a conflict, there was fighting, they were shooting. That's it. We didn't prevent them from going anywhere. We asked them to come; why to delay them? Even if you want to take the American story, they say we used chemical weapons the same day the team or the investigation team came to Syria; is it logical? It's not logical. Even if a country or army wanted to use such weapon, they should have waited a few days till the investigation finished its work. It's not logical, the whole story doesn't even hold together.
Charlie Rose: We'll come back to it. If your government did not do it, despite the evidence, who did it?
President al-Assad:We have to be there to get the evidence like what happened in Aleppo when we had evidence. And because the United States didn't send the team, we sent the evidence to the Russians.
Charlie Rose: But don't you want to know the answer, if you don't accept the evidence so far, as to who did this?
President al-Assad:The question is who threw chemicals on the same day on our soldiers. That's the same question. Technically, not the soldiers. Soldiers don't throw missiles on themselves. So, either the rebels, the terrorists, or a third party. We don't have any clue yet. We have to be there to collect the evidences then we can give answer.
Charlie Rose: Well, the argument is made that the rebels don't have their capability of using chemical weapons, they do not have the rockets and they do not have the supply of chemical weapons that you have, so therefore they could not have done it.
President al-Assad:First of all, they have rockets, and they've been throwing rockets on Damascus for months.
Charlie Rose: That carry chemical weapons?
President al-Assad: Rockets in general. They have the means - first. Second, the sarin gas that they've been talking about for the last weeks is a very primitive gas. You can have it done in the backyard of a house; it's a very primitive gas. So, it's not something complicated.
Charlie Rose: But this was not primitive. This was a terrible use of chemical weapons.
President al-Assad:Third, they used it in Aleppo in the north of Syria. Fourth, there's a video on YouTube where the terrorists clearly make trials on a rabbit and kill the rabbit and said "this is how we're going to kill the Syrian people." Fifth, there's a new video about one of those women who they consider as rebel or fighter who worked with those terrorists and she said "they didn't tell us how to use the chemical weapons" and one of those weapons exploded in one of the tunnels and killed twelve. That's what she said. Those are the evidence that we have. Anyway, the party who accused is the one who has to bring evidences. The United States accused Syria, and because you accused you have to bring evidence, this first of all. We have to find evidences when we are there.
Charlie Rose: What evidence would be sufficient for you?
President al-Assad: For example, in Aleppo we had the missile itself, and the material, and the sample from the sand, from the soil, and samples from the blood.
Charlie Rose: But the argument is made that your forces bombarded Ghouta soon thereafter with the intent of covering up evidence.
President al-Assad: How could bombardment cover the evidence? Technically, it doesn't work. How? This is stupid to be frank, this is very stupid.
Charlie Rose: But you acknowledge the bombardment?
President al-Assad: Of course, there was a fight. That happens every day; now you can have it. But, let's talk... we have indications, let me just finish this point, because how can use WMD while your troops are only 100 meters away from it? Is it logical? It doesn't happen. It cannot be used like this. Anyone who's not military knows this fact. Why do you use chemical weapons while you're advancing? Last year was much more difficult than this year, and we didn't use it.
Charlie Rose: There is this question too; if it was not you, does that mean that you don't have control of your own chemical weapons and that perhaps they have fallen into the hands of other people who might want to use them?
President al-Assad: That implies that we have chemical weapons, first. That implies that it's being used, second. So we cannot answer this question until we answer the first part and the second part. Third, let's presume that a country or army has this weapon; this kind of armaments cannot be used by infantry for example or by anyone. This kind of armament should be used by specialized units, so it cannot be in the hand of anyone.
Charlie Rose: Well, exactly, that's the point.
President al-Assad: Which is controlled centrally.
Charlie Rose: Ah, so you are saying that if in fact, your government did it, you would know about it and you would have approved it.
President al-Assad: I'm talking about a general case.
Charlie Rose: In general, you say if in fact it happened, I would have known about it and approved it. That's the nature of centralized power.
President al-Assad: Generally, in every country, yes. I'm talking about the general rules, because I cannot discuss this point with you in detail unless I'm telling you what we have and what we don't have, something I'm not going to discuss as I said at the very beginning, because this is a military issue that could not be discussed.
Charlie Rose: Do you question the New York Times article I read to you, saying you had a stockpile of chemical weapons? You're not denying that.
President al-Assad: No, we don't say yes, we don't say no, because as long as this is classified, it shouldn't be discussed.
Charlie Rose: The United States is prepared to launch a strike against your country because they believe chemical weapons are so abhorrent, that anybody who uses them crosses a red line, and that therefore, if they do that, they have to be taught a lesson so that they will not do it again.
President al-Assad: What red line? Who drew it?
Charlie Rose: The President says that it's not just him, that the world has drawn it in their revulsion against the use of chemical weapons, that the world has drawn this red line.
We have our red lines: our sovereignty, our independence
President al-Assad:Not the world, because Obama drew that line, and Obama can draw lines for himself and his country, not for other countries. We have our red lines, like our sovereignty, our independence, while if you want to talk about world red lines, the United States used depleted uranium in Iraq, Israel used white phosphorus in Gaza, and nobody said anything. What about the red lines? We don't see red lines. It's political red lines.
Charlie Rose: The President is prepared to strike, and perhaps he'll get the authorization of Congress or not. The question then is would you give up chemical weapons if it would prevent the President from authorizing a strike? Is that a deal you would accept?
President al-Assad: Again, you always imply that we have chemical weapons.
Charlie Rose: I have to, because that is the assumption of the President. That is his assumption, and he is the one that will order the strike.
President al-Assad: It's his problem if he has an assumption, but for us in Syria, we have principles. We'd do anything to prevent the region from another crazy war. It's not only Syria because it will start in Syria.
Charlie Rose: You'd do anything to prevent the region from having another crazy war?
President al-Assad: The region, yes.
Charlie Rose: You realize the consequences for you if there is a strike?
President al-Assad: It's not about me. It's about the region.
Charlie Rose: It's about your country, it's about your people.
President al-Assad: Of course, my country and me, we are part of this region, we're not separated. We cannot discuss it as Syria or as me; it should be as part, as a whole, as comprehensive. That's how we have to look at it.
Charlie Rose: Some ask why would you do it? It's a stupid thing to do if you're going to bring a strike down on your head by using chemical weapons. Others say you'd do it because A: you're desperate, or the alternative, you do it because you want other people to fear you, because these are such fearful weapons that if the world knows you have them, and specifically your opponents in Syria, the rebels, then you have gotten away with it and they will live in fear, and that therefore, the President has to do something.
President al-Assad: You cannot be desperate when the army is making advances. That should have happened -- if we take into consideration that this presumption is correct and this is reality -- you use it when you're in a desperate situation. So, our position is much better than before. So, this is not correct.
Charlie Rose: You think you're winning the war.
President al-Assad: "Winning" is a subjective word, but we are making advancement. This is the correct word, because winning for some people is when you finish completely.
Charlie Rose: Then the argument is made that if you're winning, it is because of the recent help you have got from Iran and from Hezbollah and additional supplies that have come to your side. People from outside Syria supporting you in the effort against the rebels.
President al-Assad: Iran doesn't have any soldier in Syria, so how could Iran help me?
Charlie Rose:Supplies, weaponry?
President al-Assad: That's all before the crisis. We always have this kind of cooperation.
Charlie Rose: Hezbollah, Hezbollah fighters have been here.
President al-Assad:Hezbollah fighters are on the borders with Lebanon where the terrorists attacked them. On the borders with Lebanon, this is where Hezbollah retaliated, and this is where we have cooperation, and that's good.
Charlie Rose: Hezbollah forces are in Syria today?
President al-Assad: On the border area with Lebanon where they want to protect themselves and cooperate with us, but they don't exist all over Syria. They cannot exist all over Syria anyway, for many reasons, but they exist on the borders.
Charlie Rose: What advice are you getting from the Russians?
President al-Assad: About?
Charlie Rose: About this war, about how to end this war.
President al-Assad:Every friend of Syria is looking for peaceful solution
President al-Assad: Every friend of Syria is looking for peaceful solution, and we are convinced about that. We have this advice, and without this advice we are convinced about it.
Charlie Rose: Do you have a plan to end the war?
President al-Assad: Of course.
Charlie Rose: Which is?
President al-Assad: At the very beginning, it was fully political. When you have these terrorists, the first part of the same plan which is political should start with stopping the smuggling of terrorists coming from abroad, stopping the logistic support, the money, all kinds of support coming to these terrorists. This is the first part. Second, we can have national dialogue where different Syrian parties sit and discuss the future of Syria. Third, you can have interim government or transitional government. Then you have final elections, parliamentary elections, and you're going to have presidential elections.
Charlie Rose: But the question is: would you meet with rebels today to discuss a negotiated settlement?
President al-Assad: In the initiative that we issued at the beginning of this year we said every party with no exceptions as long as they give up their armaments.
Charlie Rose: But you'll meet with the rebels and anybody who's fighting against you if they give up their weapons?
President al-Assad: We don't have a problem.
Charlie Rose: Then they will say "you are not giving up your weapons, why should we give up our weapons?"
President al-Assad: Does a government give up its weapons? Have you heard about that before?
Charlie Rose: No, but rebels don't normally give up their weapons either during the negotiations; they do that after a successful...
President al-Assad: The armament of the government is legal armament. Any other armament is not legal. So how can you compare? It's completely different.
Charlie Rose: There's an intense discussion going on about all the things we're talking about in Washington, where if there's a strike, it will emanate from the United States' decision to do this. What do you want to say, in this very important week, in America, and in Washington, to the American people, the members of Congress, to the President of the United States?
President al-Assad: I think the most important part of this now is, let's say the American people, but the polls show that the majority now don't want a war, anywhere, not only against Syria, but the Congress is going to vote about this in a few days, and I think the Congress is elected by people, it represents the people, and works for their interest. The first question that they should ask themselves: what do wars give America, since Vietnam till now? Nothing. No political gain, no economic gain, no good reputation. The United States' credibility is at an all-time low. So, this war is against the interest of the Untied States. Why? First, this war is going to support Al-Qaeda and the same people that killed Americans in the 11th of September. The second thing that we want to tell Congress, that they should ask and that what we expect them to ask this administration about the evidence that they have regarding the chemical story and allegations that they presented.
I wouldn't tell the President or any other official, because we are disappointed by their behavior recently, because we expected this administration to be different from Bush's administration. They are adopting the same doctrine with different accessories. That's it. So if we want to expect something from this administration, it is not to be weak, to be strong to say that "we don't have evidence," that "we have to obey the international law", that "we have to go back to the Security Council and the United Nations".
Charlie Rose: The question remains; what can you say to the President who believes chemical weapons were used by your government; that this will not happen again.
President al-Assad: I will tell him very simply: present what you have as evidence to the public, be transparent.
Charlie Rose: And if he does? If he presents that evidence?
President al-Assad: This is where we can discuss the evidence, but he doesn't have it. He didn't present it because he doesn't have it, Kerry doesn't have it. No one in your administration has it. If they had it, they would have presented it to you as media from the first day.
Charlie Rose: They have presented it to the Congress.
President al-Assad: Nothing. Nothing was presented.
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Charlie Rose: They've shown the Congress what they have, and the evidence they have, from satellite intercepted messages and the like.
President al-Assad: Nothing has been presented so far.
Charlie Rose: They have presented it to the Congress, sir.
President al-Assad: You are a reporter. Get this evidence and show it to the public in your country.
Charlie Rose: They're presenting it to the public representative. You don't show your evidence and what you're doing and your plans to people within your own council. They're showing it to the people's representative who have to vote on an authorization to strike, and if they don't find the evidence sufficient...
President al-Assad: First of all, we have the precedent of Collin Powell ten years ago, when he showed the evidence, it was false, and it was forged. This is first. Second, you want me to believe American evidence and don't want me to believe the indications that we have. We live here, this is our reality.
Charlie Rose: Your indications are what?
President al-Assad: That the rebels or the terrorists used the chemical weapons in northern Aleppo five months ago.
Charlie Rose: And on August 21st?
President al-Assad: No, no, no. That was before. On the 21st, again they used it against our soldiers in our area where we control it, and our soldiers went to the hospital, you can see them if you want.
Charlie Rose: But Ghouta is not controlled by your forces, it's controlled by the rebel forces. The area where that attack took place is controlled by rebel forces.
President al-Assad: What if they have stockpiles and they exploded because of the bombardment? What if they used the missile by mistake and attacked themselves by mistake?
Charlie Rose: Let me move to the question of whether a strike happens, and I touched on this before. You have had fair warning. Have you prepared by moving possible targets, are you moving targets within civilian populations, all the things that you might have done if you have time to do that and you have had clear warning that this might be coming?
President al-Assad:Syria is in a state of war since its land was occupied for more than four decades, and the nature of the frontier in Syria implies that most of the army is in inhabited areas, most of the centers are in inhabited areas. You hardly find any military base in distant areas from the cities unless it's an airport or something like this, but most of the military bases or centers within inhabited areas.
Charlie Rose: Will there be attacks against American bases in the Middle East if there's an airstrike?
President al-Assad: You should expect everything. Not necessarily through the government, the governments are not the only player in this region. You have different parties, different factions, you have different ideologies; you have everything in this region now. So, you have to expect that.
Charlie Rose: Tell me what you mean by "expect everything."
President al-Assad: Expect every action.
Charlie Rose: Including chemical warfare?
President al-Assad: That depends. If the rebels or the terrorists in this region or any other group have it, this could happen, I don't know. I'm not a fortuneteller to tell you what's going to happen.
Charlie Rose: But we'd like to know more, I think the President would like to know, the American people would like to know. If there is an attack, what might be the repercussions and who might be engaged in those repercussions?
President al-Assad: Okay, before the 11th of September, in my discussions with many officials of the United States, some of them are Congressmen, I used to say that "don't deal with terrorists as playing games." It's a different story. You're going to pay the price if you're not wise in dealing with terrorists. We said you're going to be repercussions of the mistaken way of dealing with it, of treating the terrorism, but nobody expected 11th of September. So, you cannot expect. It is difficult for anyone to tell you what is going to happen. It's an area where everything is on the brink of explosion. You have to expect everything.
Charlie Rose: Let's talk about the war today. A hundred thousand people dead. A million refugees. A country being destroyed. Do you take some responsibility for that?
President al-Assad: That depends on the decision that I took. From the first day I took the decision as President to defend my country. So, who killed? That's another question. Actually, the terrorists have been killing our people since the beginning of this crisis two years and a half ago, and the Syrian people wanted the government and the state institutions and the army and the police to defend them, and that's what happened. So we're talking about the responsibility, my responsibility according to the Syrian constitution that said we have to defend ourselves.
Charlie Rose: Mr. President, you constantly say "it's terrorists." Most people look at the rebels and they say that Al-Qaeda and other forces from outside Syria are no more than 15 or 20 percent of the forces on the ground. The other 80% are Syrians, are defectors from your government, and defectors from your military. They are people who are Syrians who believe that their country should not be run by a dictator, should not be run by one family, and that they want a different government in their country. That's 80% of the people fighting against you, not terrorists.
President al-Assad: We didn't say that 80%, for example, or the majority or the vast majority, are foreigners. We said the vast majority are Al-Qaeda or Al-Qaeda offshoot organizations in this region. When you talk about Al-Qaeda it doesn't matter if he's Syrian or American or from Europe or from Asia or Africa. Al-Qaeda has one ideology and they go back to the same leadership in Afghanistan or in Syria or in Iraq. That's the question. You have tens of thousands of foreigners, that's definitely correct. We are fighting them on the ground and we know this.
Charlie Rose: But that's 15 or 20% of this. That's a realistic look at how many.
President al-Assad: Nobody knows because when they are dead and they are killed, they don't have any ID. You look at their faces, they look foreigners, but where are they coming from? How precise this estimate is difficult to tell, but definitely the majority are Al-Qaeda. This is what concerns us, not the nationality. If you have Syrian Al-Qaeda, or Pakistani Al-Qaeda or Saudi Al-Qaeda, what's the difference? What does it matter? The most important thing is that the majority are Al-Qaeda. We never said that the majority are not Syrians, but we said that the minority is what they call "free Syrian army." That's what we said.
Charlie Rose: Do you believe this is becoming a religious war?
President al-Assad: It started partly as a sectarian war in some areas, but now it's not, because when you talk about sectarian war or religious war, you should have a very clear line between the sects and religions in Syria according to the geography and the demography in Syria, something we don't have. So, it's not religious war, but Al-Qaeda always use religions, Islam - actually, as a pretext and as a cover and as a mantle for their war and for their terrorism and for their killing and beheading and so on.
Charlie Rose:Why has this war lasted two and a half years?
President al-Assad:Because of the external interference, because there is an external agenda supported by, or let's say led by the United States, the West, the petrodollar countries, mainly Saudi Arabia, and before was Qatar, and Turkey. That's why it lasted two years and a half.
Charlie Rose: But what are they doing, those countries you cited?
The West wanted to undermine the Syrian positions
President al-Assad: They have different agendas. For the West, they wanted to undermine the Syrian positions. For the petrodollar countries like Saudi Arabia, they're thinking undermining Syria will undermine Iran on sectarian basis. For Turkey, they think that if the Muslim Brotherhood take over the rest of the region, they will be very comfortable, they will be very happy, they will make sure that their political future is guaranteed. So they have different agendas and different goals.
Charlie Rose: But at the same time, as I said, you used Hezbollah and got support from Iran, from Russia. So, what is happening here. Is this a kind of war that exists because of support from outside Syria on both sides?
President al-Assad: This is cooperation, I don't know what you mean by support. We have cooperation with countries for decades. Why talk about this cooperation now?
Charlie Rose: Then you tell me, what are you receiving from Iran?
President al-Assad: Political support. We have agreements with many countries including Iran, including Russia, including other countries that are about different things including armament. It's cooperation like any cooperation between any two countries, which is normal. It's not related to the crisis. You don't call it support, because you pay money for what you get. So, you don't call it support, it's cooperation, call it whatever you want, but the word "support" is not precise. From Russia for example, we have political support, which is different from the cooperation. We have cooperation for 60 years now, but now we have political support.
Charlie Rose: Well, the Russians said they have ongoing support for you, but beyond just political cooperation. I mean they have treaties that existed with Syria.
President al-Assad: Exactly.
Charlie Rose: And they provide all kinds of defensive weapons.
President al-Assad: You said treaties, and a Russian official said; we have not agreement... contracts, that we have to fulfill, and those contracts are like any country; you buy armaments, you buy anything you want.
Charlie Rose: But do you believe this has become a conflict of Sunni vs. Shia'a?
President al-Assad: No, not yet. This is in the mind of the Saudis, and this is in the minds of the Wahabists.
Charlie Rose: And in the minds of the Iranians?
President al-Assad: No, no, actually what they are doing is the opposite. They tried to open channels with the Saudi, with many other Islamic entities in the region in order to talk about Islamic society, not Sunni and Shi'ite societies.
Charlie Rose: Was there a moment for you, when you saw the Arab spring approaching Syria, that you said "I've seen what happened in Libya, I've seen what happened in Tunisia, I've seen what happened in Egypt, it's not gonna happen to Bashar al-al-Assad. I will fight anybody that tries to overthrow my regime with everything I have."
President al-Assad: No, for one reason; because the first question that I ask: do I have public support or not. That is the first question that I asked as President. If I don't have the public support, whether there's the so-called "Arab spring" -- it's not spring, anyway -- but whether we have this or we don't, if you don't have public support, you have to quit, you have to leave. If you have public support, in any circumstances you have to stay. That's your mission, you have to help the people, you have to serve the people.
Charlie Rose: When you say "public support" people point to Syria and say a minority sect, Alawites, control a majority Sunni population, and they say "dictatorship" and they do it because it because of the force of their own instruments of power. That's what you have, not public support, for this war against other Syrians.
President al-Assad: Now, it's been two years and a half, ok? Two years and a half and Syria is still withstanding against the United States, the West, Saudi Arabia, the richest countries in this area, including Turkey, and, taking into consideration what your question implies, that even the big part or the bigger part of the Syrian population is against me, how can I withstand till today? Am I the superhuman or Superman, which is not the case!
Charlie Rose: Or you have a powerful army.
President al-Assad: The army is made of the people; it cannot be made of robots. It's made of people.
Charlie Rose: Surely you're not suggesting that this army is not at your will and the will of your family.
President al-Assad: What do you mean by "will of the family?"
Charlie Rose: The will of your family. Your brother is in the military. The military has been... every observer of Syria believes that this is a country controlled by your family and controlled by the Alawites who are your allies. That's the control.
President al-Assad: If that situation was correct - what you're mentioning - we wouldn't have withstood for two years and a half. We would have disintegration of the army, disintegration of the whole institution in the state; we would have disintegration of Syria if that was the case. It can't be tolerated in Syria. I'm talking about the normal reaction of the people. If it's not a national army, it cannot have the support, and if it doesn't have the public support of every sect, it cannot do its job and advance recently. It cannot. The army of the family doesn't make national war.
Charlie Rose: Some will argue that you didn't have this support because in fact the rebels were winning before you got the support of Hezbollah and an enlarged support from the Iranians, that you were losing and then they came in and gave you support so that you were able to at least start winning and produce at least a stalemate.
President al-Assad: No, the context is wrong, because talking about winning and losing is like if you're talking about two armies fighting on two territories, which is not the case. Those are gangs, coming from abroad, infiltrate inhabited areas, kill the people, take their houses, and shoot at the army. The army cannot do the same, and the army doesn't exist everywhere.
Charlie Rose: But they control a large part of your country.
President al-Assad: No, they went to every part there's no army in it, and the army went to clean and get rid of them. They don't go to attack the army in an area where the army occupied that area and took it from it. It's completely different, it's not correct, or it's not precise what you're talking about. So, it's completely different. What the army is doing is cleaning those areas, and the indication that the army is strong is that it's making advancement in that area. It never went to one area and couldn't enter to it - that's an indication. How could that army do that if it's a family army or a sect army? What about the rest of the country who support the government? It's not realistic, it doesn't happen. Otherwise, the whole country will collapse.
Charlie Rose: One small point about American involvement here, the President's gotten significant criticism because he has not supported the rebels more. As you know, there was an argument within his own counsels from Secretary of State Clinton, from CIA Director David Petraeus, from the Defense Department, Leon Penetta, Secretary of Defense, and others, that they should have helped the rebels two years ago, and we would be in a very different place, so the President has not given enough support to the rebels in the view of many people, and there's criticism that when he made a recent decision to give support, it has not gotten to the rebels, because they worry about the composition.
President al-Assad:If the American administration want to support Al-Qaeda - go ahead. That's what we have to tell them, go ahead and support Al-Qaeda, but don't talk about rebels and free Syrian army. The majority of fighters now are Al-Qaeda. If you want to support them, you are supporting Al-Qaeda, you are creating havoc in the region, and if this region is not stable, the whole world cannot be stable.
Charlie Rose: With respect, sir, most people don't believe the majority of forces are Al-Qaeda. Yes, there is a number of people who are Al-Qaeda affiliates and who are here who subscribe to the principles of Al-Qaeda, but that's not the majority of the forces as you know. You know that the composition differs within the regions of Syria as to the forces that are fighting against your regime.
The American officials should learn to deal with reality
President al-Assad:The American officials should learn to deal with reality. Why did the United States fail in most of its wars? Because it always based its wars on the wrong information. So, whether they believe or not, this is not reality. I have to be very clear and very honest. I'm not asking them to believe if they don't want to believe. This is reality, I'm telling you the reality from our country. We live here, we know what is happening, and they have to listen to people here. They cannot listen only to their media or to their research centers. They don't live here; no one lives here but us. So, this is reality. If they want to believe, that's good, that will help them understand the region and be more successful in their policies.
Charlie Rose: Many people think this is not a sustainable position here; that this war cannot continue, because the cost for Syria is too high. Too many deaths - a hundred thousand and counting, too many refugees, too much destruction; the soul of a country at risk. If it was for the good of the country, would you step down?
President al-Assad: That depends on the relation of me staying in this position and the conflict. We cannot discuss it just to say you have to step down. Step down, why, and what is the expected result? This is first. Second, when you're in the middle of a storm, leaving your country just because you have to leave without any reasonable reason, it means you're quitting your country and this is treason.
Charlie Rose: You say it would be treason for you to step down right now because of your obligation to the country?
President al-Assad: Unless the public wants you to quit.
Charlie Rose: And how will you determine that?
President al-Assad: By the two years and a half withstanding. Without the public support, we cannot withstand two years and a half. Look at the other countries, look what happened in Libya, in Tunisia and in Egypt.
Charlie Rose: You worry about that, what happened to Gaddafi?
President al-Assad: No, we are worried that rebels are taking control in many countries, and look at the results now. Are you satisfied as an American? What are the results? Nothing. Very bad - nothing good.
Charlie Rose: There was a report recently that you had talked about, or someone representing you had talked about some kind of deal in which you and your family would leave the country if you were guaranteed safe passage, if you were guaranteed that there would be no criminal prosecution. You're aware of these reports?
President al-Assad: We had this guarantee from the first day of the crisis.
Charlie Rose: Because of the way you acted?
President al-Assad: No, because of the agenda that I talked about. Some of these agendas wanted me to quit, very simply, so they said "we have all the guarantees if you want to leave, and all the money and everything you want." Of course, you just ignore that.
Charlie Rose: So, you've been offered that opportunity?
President al-Assad: Yeah, but it's not about me, again, this fight is not my fight, it's not the fight of the government; it's the fight of the country, of the Syrian people. That's how we look at it. It's not about me.
Charlie Rose: It's not about you?
President al-Assad: It's about every Syrian.
Charlie Rose: How will this war end? I referred to this question earlier. What's the endgame?
President al-Assad:It's very simple; once the Western countries stop supporting those terrorists and making pressure on their puppet countries and client states like Saudi Arabia and Turkey and others, you'll have no problem in Syria. It will be solved easily, because those fighters, the Syrian part that you're talking about, lost its natural incubators in the Syrian society - they don't have incubators anymore; that's why they have incubators abroad. They need money from abroad, they need moral support and political support from abroad. They don't have any grassroots, any incubator. So, when you stop the smuggling, we don't have problems.
Charlie Rose: Yeah, but at the same time, as I've said before, you have support from abroad. There are those who say you will not be able to survive without the support of Russia and Iran. Your government would not be able to survive.
President al-Assad: No, it's not me, I don't have support. Not me; all Syria. Every agreement is between every class and every sector in Syria; government, people, trade, military, culture, everything; it's like the cooperation between your country and any other country in the world. It's the same cooperation. It's not about me; it's not support for the crisis.
Charlie Rose: I mean about your government. You say that the rebels only survive because they have support from Saudi Arabia and Turkey and the United States, and Qatar perhaps, and I'm saying you only survive because you have the support of Russia and Iran and Hezbollah.
External support can never substitute internal support
President al-Assad: No, the external support can never substitute internal support, it can never, for sure. And the example that we have to look at very well is Egypt and Tunisia; they have all the support from the West and from the Gulf and from most of the countries of the world. When they don't have support within their country, they couldn't continue more than -- how many weeks? - three weeks. So, the only reason we stand here for two years and a half is because we have internal support, public support. So, any external support, if you want to call it support, let's use this world, is... how to say... it's going to be additional, but it's not the base to depend on more than the Syrian support.
Charlie Rose: You and I talked about this before; we remember Hama and your father, Hafez al-Assad. He... ruthlessly... set out to eliminate the Muslim Brotherhood. Are you simply being your father's son here?
President al-Assad: I don't know what you mean by ruthlessly, I've never heard of soft war. Have you heard about soft war? There's no soft war. War is war. Any war is ruthless. When you fight terrorists, you fight them like any other war.
Charlie Rose: So, the lessons you have here are the lessons you learned from your father and what he did in Hama, which, it is said, influenced you greatly in terms of your understanding of what you have to do.
President al-Assad: The question: what would you do as an American if the terrorists are invading your country from different areas and started killing tens of thousands of Americans?
Charlie Rose: You refer to them as terrorists, but in fact it is a popular revolution, people believe, against you, that was part of the Arab spring that influenced some of the other countries.
President al-Assad: Revolution should be Syrian, cannot be revolution imported from abroad.
Charlie Rose: It didn't start from abroad; it started here.
President al-Assad:These people that started here, they support the government now against those rebels. That's what you don't know. What you don't know as an American you don't know as a reporter. That's why talking about what happened at the very beginning is completely different from what is happening now - it's not the same. There's very high dynamic, things are changing on daily basis. It's a completely different image. Those people who wanted revolution, they are cooperating with us.
Charlie Rose: I'm asking you again, is it in fact you're being your father's son and you believe that the only way to drive out people is to eliminate them the same way your father did?
President al-Assad: In being independent? Yes. In fighting terrorists? Yes. In defending the Syrian people and the country? Yes.
Charlie Rose: When I first interviewed you, there was talk of Bashar al-al-Assad... he's the hope, he's the reform. That's not what they're saying anymore.
President al-Assad: Who?
Charlie Rose: People who write about you, people who talk about you, people who analyze Syria and your regime.
President al-Assad: Exactly, the hope for an American is different from the hope of a Syrian. For me, I should be the hope of the Syrian, not any other one, not American, neither French, nor anyone in the world. I'm President to help the Syrian people. So, this question should start from the hope of the Syrian people, and if there is any change regarding that hope, we should ask the Syrian people, not anyone else in the world.
Charlie Rose: But now they say -- their words -- a butcher. Comparisons to the worst dictators that ever walked on the face of the Earth, comparing you to them. Using weapons that go beyond warfare. Everything they could say bad about a dictator, they're now saying about you.
President al-Assad: First of all, when you have a doctor who cut the leg to prevent the patient from the gangrene if you have to, we don't call butcher; you call him a doctor, and thank you for saving the lives. When you have terrorism, you have a war. When you have a war, you always have innocent lives that could be the victim of any war, so, we don't have to discuss what the image in the west before discussing the image in Syria. That's the question.
Charlie Rose: It's not just the West. I mean it's the East, and the Middle East, and, I mean, you know, the eyes of the world have been on Syria. We have seen atrocities on both sides, but on your side as well. They have seen brutality by a dictator that they say put you in a category with the worst.
President al-Assad: So we have to allow the terrorists to come and kill the Syrians and destroy the country much, much more. This is where you can be a good President? That's what you imply.
Charlie Rose: But you can't allow the idea that there's opposition to your government from within Syria. That is not possible for you to imagine.
President al-Assad: To have opposition? We have it, and you can go and meet with them. We have some of them within the government, we have some of them outside the government. They are opposition. We have it.
Charlie Rose: But those are the people who have been fighting against you.
President al-Assad:Opposition is different from terrorism. Opposition is a political movement. Opposition doesn't mean to take arms and kill people and destroy everything. Do you call the people in Los Angeles in the nineties - do you call them rebels or opposition? What did the British call the rebels less than two years ago in London? Did they call them opposition or rebels? Why should we call them opposition? They are rebels. They are not rebels even, they are beheading. This opposition, opposing country or government, by beheading? By barbecuing heads? By eating the hearts of your victim? Is that opposition? What do you call the people who attacked the two towers on the 11th of September? #fnSubj2" id="txtSubj2">2 Opposition? Even if they're not Americans, I know this, but some of them I think have nationality - I think one of them has American nationality. Do you call him opposition or terrorist? Why should you use a term in the United States and England and maybe other countries and use another term in Syria? This is a double standard that we don't accept.
Charlie Rose: I once asked you what you fear the most and you said the end of Syria as a secular state. Is that end already here?
President al-Assad:According to what we've been seeing recently in the area where the terrorists control, where they ban people from going to schools, ban young men from shaving their beards, and women have to be covered from head to toe, and let's say in brief they live the Taliban style in Afghanistan, completely the same style. With the time, yes we can be worried, because the secular state should reflect secular society, and this secular society, with the time, if you don't get rid of those terrorists and these extremists and the Wahabi style, of course it will influence at least the new and the coming generations. So, we don't say that we don't have it, we're still secular in Syria, but with the time, this secularism will be eroded.
Charlie Rose: Mr. President, thank you for allowing us to have this conversation about Syria and the war that is within as well as the future of the country. Thank you.
President al-Assad: Thank you for coming to Syria.
#fnSubj1" id="fnSubj1">1. #txtSubj1">↑ This incorrectly presumes that the rulers of the New World Order would be threatened by terrorism. In fact, terrorism has helped the ruling elites far more than it has threatened them. In the 19th Century, when bombs thrown by police provocateurs at Haymarket in the U.S. the police were given the excuse needed to shoot protesting strikers. In the late 20th Century, terrorist acts by supposedly 'radical', 'left-wing' groups, such as the Italian Red Brigades and the German Baade-Meinhof gang, have provided the respective governments convenient excuses to spy on opposition political groups and to enact legislation to take away citizens' democratic rights.
The only contexts in which terrorism would make any sense at all is in contexts where formal democracy has been abolished These include Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy and the Latin American dictatorships of the 20th Century. Conceivably, if the current Syrian government were to be overthrown and replaced by the sectarian theocratic dictatorship that the opposition terrorists are fighting to establish, terrorism could be an appropriate form of resistance. But such a future outcome is hardly a reason for the U.S. and its allies to fear the consequences of the overthrow of the Syrian Government.
Sadly, the other additional terrorism, from anti-Western Islamist ideologues, that would result from the defeat of the Syrian government, of which President al-Assad warns, would be a win-win outcome for the NWO.
#fnSubj2" id="fnSubj2">2. #txtSubj2">↑ On 8 September 2011, Russia Today released a video report (since also embedded here on candobetter) which presented much of the evidence that senior figures within the U.S. administration of President George W. Bush, including the President himself, Vice President Dick Cheney, Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld and Deputy Secretary of Defence Paul Wolfowitz had been complicit in the death of 2,977 American residents on 11 September;2011. They did so to contrive an excuse for the United States to wage wars against Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and, now, Syria, in which hundreds of thousands have died, by blaming the crime on 19 alleged hijackers who were allegedly sent to the U.S. by the government of Afghanistan. Whilst it has been known for years that the Official U.S. Government account of 9/11 was a lie, this exposure of the truth about 9/11 by a mainstream news outlet like Russia Today lifts the whole profile of the struggle for truth and the search for justice for the crime of 9/11. President al-Assad should be advised that his case against the U.S. Government war criminals would be made stronger still, if he were tell the world more directly the facts about 9/11.
Guest column by the distinguished commentator and radio host Stephen Lendman:
Syria has agreed to the Russian proposal to give up its chemical weapons, but the war criminal and totally isolated obama regime, the scum of the earth, says it will attack Syria regardless.
How will the world respond to the Amerikan Third Reich, the worst threat to truth, justice, peace, and humanity that the world has ever experienced? Will the world submit to rule by an outlaw state whose corrupt government represents no one but the Israel Lobby?
September 09, 2013 "Information Clearing House - Russian Foreign Sergei Lavrov wants peace. He's going all out against war on Syria. He's doing it responsibly.
Important world leaders back him. So does overwhelming global anti-war sentiment.
"We are calling on the Syrian authorities not only agree on putting chemical weapons storages under international control, but also for its further destruction and then joining the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons," he said.
"We have passed our offer to Muallem and hope to receive a fast and positive answer."
Al-Moallem pledged "full cooperation with Russia to remove any pretext for aggression." Lavrov promised Moscow's support.
He's trying to broker a diplomatic solution. In return, he wants Obama to cancel attack plans.
He cited John Kerry saying Assad "could turn over every single bit of his chemical weapons to the international community in the next week."
"Turn it over, all of it without delay and allow (a) full and total accounting, but he isn't about to do it and it can't be done."
Doing it would avoid military intervention, Kerry said. Damage control followed his statement. State Department spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki reinterpreted his comments.
He "was making a rhetorical argument about the impossibility and unlikelihood of Assad turning over chemical weapons," she said.
"His point was that this brutal dictator with a history of playing fast and loose with the facts cannot be trusted to turn over chemical weapons, otherwise he would have done so long ago. That's why the world faces this moment."
Reinterpreting Kerry's statement shows Obama's true intention. Falsely blaming Assad for using chemical weapons is cover for long planned regime change.
War is Obama's option of choice. Lavrov's best efforts may fall short. He forthrightly pursued them throughout months of conflict. He's not about to stop now.
He faces long odds. Obama didn't wage war on Syria to quit. He won't do so no matter what Lavrov, Moallem, Assad or other Syrian officials pledge. Rogues states operate that way. America's by far the worst.
Moallem's doing his best anyway. So is Lavrov. From Moscow, he said:
"We have agreed on practical steps to be taken bilaterally and in cooperation with other states for giving the political settlement a chance."
"No matter how serious the current situation may be, our Syrian partners and we are confident that possibilities remain for a political settlement."
"Russia has been staying in touch with all (Syrian) opposition groups without an exception in the recent years and we will carry on our efforts to try to convince them that there is no alternative to an international conference."
"If our contacts express that this (conference) may help, then we do not rule out the possibility of an invitation to Moscow of all who are interested in peace and a political settlement in Syria and reject the military scenario."
"What are the real interests of the US behind launching this aggression," he asked?
"Obama is not listening to Americans, Europeans, and UK Parliament. We thank American people for standing against striking Syria."
"We admire the American people who voice their protest against military intervention," added Muallem.
"What are the real interests of the United States behind launching this aggression? Why does US want to help those who are behind 9/11?
Washington "will be wrong to destroy (Syria's) army and help Al Qaeda. We're confident Russian efforts on peace talks will stop strikes."
Lavrov replied, saying:
"UN inspectors should return to Syria to investigate alleged use of chemical weapons."
"The alleged chemical attack on August 21 was orchestrated." Anti-Assad elements bear full responsibility.
"We must consolidate government and rebels to evict terrorists. We are taking active moves to prevent devastating strike. Every report on chemical arms use must be closely studied."
"Syria is open to Geneva-2 peace talks with no pre-conditions. We call on US colleagues to focus on talks, not on strikes."
"Syria strike will only enable terrorism. Russia believes no group should monopolize peace talks."
"Dialogue is necessary among all Syrians. It's the only solution. UN inspectors must go back to Syria, but some powers are obstructing."
He left no doubt which ones he means. They're headquartered in Washington. Obama's a warmaker. He deplores peace. He's going all out to prevent it. He plans war to do so.
"Russia is well-supported in the view that military action in Syria will provoke rampant terrorism," said Lavrov.
Moallem said his government is ready for Geneva II with no preconditions. "We are still ready to do that. But I do not know what may happen after an act of aggression by the United States. Probably a missile will fly over and thwart this.
America sides with terrorists, he added. It plans to be Al Qaeda's air force.
"But if such aggression against Syria aims, as we suspect, to considerably weaken the military potential of the Syrian army in the interest of al-Qaeda and various affiliated groups, then we will raise our objections," he stressed.
"Then we have the right to ask a question about the genuine interests of the United States that wishes to unleash an attack on the behalf of Jabhat al-Nusra and similar groups."
"We've come here just as the US is sounding war drums. Our feeling is that Russia plays an important role of staving off aggression."
"That is where Russia's moral ground lies, since a peacekeeper is always stronger than a warmonger."
"Mr. Assad has sent his regards and said he was grateful to Mr. Putin for his stand on Syria both before and after the G20 summit."
"Russia plays an important role in preventing aggression."
Lavrov added that Russia's "stand on Syria is unwavering and does not permit a military solution of the Syrian conflict, especially foreign intervention."
"The position of Russia is well-known. It is immune to change and varying circumstances."
"This position says there is no alternative to peaceful, diplomatic settlement of the Syrian conflict, especially not a military solution employing foreign intervention."
"On the background of the unfolding campaign calling to use force against Damascus, Russia is taking steps to prevent a pernicious situation in the Middle East."
"There cannot be any deals behind backs of the Syrian people from the Russian side in what refers to the policies Russia is following."
He added that force against Syria would cause a wave of regional terrorism. Perhaps that's precisely what Obama intends.
He needs pretexts to intervene. Peace and stability defeat his agenda. It requires violence and destabilization. He plans lots more ahead.
He faces stiff world opposition. On September 9, Reuters headlined "Analysis: Obama growing isolated on Syria as support wanes".
"White House efforts to convince the US Congress to back military action against Syria are not only failing, they seem to be stiffening the opposition."
He's making more enemies than friends. He's doing so at home and abroad. Skeptics way outnumber supporters.
Hindsight may show he shot himself in the foot. Peace activists hope so. He'll give it another go Tuesday night. He'll try enlisting support for what most people reject.
They're tired of being lied to. They want peace, stability, and jobs. They want America's resources directed toward creating them.
They want leadership representing everyone equitably. Obama's polar opposite. He supports wealth, power and privilege alone. He spurns popular interests.
He chooses war over peace. He's less able to sell what most people reject. Odds favor he'll attack Syria anyway.
Pretexts are easy to fabricate. They're longstanding US policy. Expect another major one if Ghouta's Big Lie falls flat. It's likely planned ready to be implemented if needed.
Stephen Lendman lives in Chicago. He can be reached at [email protected]. His new book is titled "Banker Occupation: Waging Financial War on Humanity." http://www.claritypress.com/LendmanII.html - Visit his blog site at sjlendman.blogspot.com.
Listen to cutting-edge discussions with distinguished guests on the Progressive Radio News Hour on the Progressive Radio Network. It airs Fridays at 10AM US Central time and Saturdays and Sundays at noon. All programs are archived for easy listening.
A few years ago I was introduced to Dr. Al Bartlett's "Arithmetic, population and energy" lecture recorded at the University of Colorado , (Boulder) U.S.A. To me, the message was so clear, engaging and logical that no-one could fail to understand it and hopefully none would fail to see the significance.
– He was saying that what may look to be ample reserves , for example, 500 years of coal still in the ground will not last anywhere near that as the demand for that resource increases with exponential population growth.
He was talking to a lecture theatre of students and I thought, "That's good. They cannot fail to understand the significance of exponential growth combined with the use of a finite resource and the implications. I read that Prof. Bartlett has given this lecture 1,600 times since 1969 http://www.albartlett.org/presentations/arithmetic_population_energy.html to average audiences of 80 people. That is 128,000 who have heard his lecture live. One of the You Tube videos of this talk has had 37,720 views. Someone in that large audience over those 4 decades must have realised from them that humanity is in real trouble over finite energy resources and an ever growing population!
Today I heard that Al Bartlett has died. There will be no more lectures to students in Universities, but we can still hear the important and clear message from Prof. Bartlett by going to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9znsuCphHUU. Believe me, you will not be bored, you should be spellbound.
As the world approaches the 12th anniversary of the terrorist attack of 11 September 2011 (9/11) which destroyed the World Trade Centre Twin Towers and a third tower, the World Trade Center Building 7 (WTC7), Russia Today has released a video, presented by Daniel Bush (pictured), which tells the truth about (9/11). Informed and honest people have for years tried to show that the official US government account of what occurred was impossible. As one of many examples, WTC7 could not have collapsed at free fall speed, if fire alone had been the cause. There is no other way known to engineers to cause the collapse of a steel framed building at free fall speed unless its supporting steel structure had been removed with demolition explosives. Many witnesses have attested to having heard explosions. This is is also confirmed by much of the video footage of the 'collapsing' Twin Towers. In recent years, PressTV, Russia Today and other newsmedia with integrity, have begun, more and more, to challenge the Official 9/11 lie. This report by a broadcaster with the profile of Russia Today on the eave of the 12th anniversary of 9/11, will make it impossible for the Mainstream presstitute media to continue to conceal the truth of 9/11 from the public.
A copy of a video by the western backed anti-government jihadists 'explains' to viewers how Bibles seized from Syrian Christians pose an even greater threat than the chemical weapons1 allegedly used by the Syrian government:
"O nation of Muhammed, wake up! For there are things even more dangerous than chemical weapons. Beware the Christianization campaigns." (sign in arabic displayed near the star of the video)
...
"They exploit the needs of Syrian citzens in order to spread Christian thought."
...
"Very large quantities of evangelization and Christianization books ..."
"... that are brought in by Western organsizations to support the needs of Syrian citizens"
...
Syria was amongst the very first countries to adopt Chrstianity
In fact, Christianity was never "brought in" from the west. Syria, along with neighbouring Palaestine, was one of the first areas to adopt Christianity in the very early years of the first Millenium, well before Islam was founded in 622AD. Christianity was spread from Syria, as well as Palestine, to the west and the rest of the world. The ignorance of hitory and culture in this video is striking.
by Jamison Maeda. First published on Clare Daly's web site (http://claredaly.ie) on 7 Sep 2013. (Emphasis not in Original.)
Bradley Manning was a 25 year old intelligence analyst in the US Army, who was arrested in 2010 for leaking hundreds of thousands of confidential, government and military documents to the public via Wikileaks. Manning claimed his objective was to remove "the fog of war and reveal the true nature of 21st century asymmetric warfare." Manning accomplished much more.
Manning was believed to be responsible for the Wikileaks release of 38 minutes of cockpit gun sight footage of an American airstrike in Baghdad in 2007. The video shows a United States Army AH 64 Apache helicopter killing a group of men including a Reuters journalist and photographer, and a civilian man who stopped to assist the wounded. That man's two children were also wounded in the attack. (Preventing those who attempt to assist wounded in battle is a violation of Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions and considered a war crime.)
Also, Manning was believed to have provided Wikileaks with video of the Granai Airstrike of a B-1 Bomber in 2009, also known as the Granai massacre. Between 86 and 147 civilians, mostly women and children, were killed during the strike in the Farah province of Afghanistan. (Deliberately directing an attack on a civilian population or on individual civilians not taking part in direct hostilities is considered a war crime.)
Nearly 780 formerly secret documents known as the Guantanamo Bay File Leak, also attributed to Manning, revealed the detention of over 150 innocent Afghani and Pakistani farmers, drivers, cooks, and a 14 year old boy held for several years without being charged of a crime. There was also evidence of sexual abuse and torture. The UK Court of Appeal ruled former prisoner, Binyam Mohamed, a citizen of the United Kingdom, was the victim of "cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment by the United States authorities" and awarded him compensation in the amount of £1 million.
Documents known as the War Logs also allegedly provided to Wikileaks by Manning showed much larger civilian casualties than previously reported by the United States. The reports from the Iraq War Log recorded the deaths of 66,000 civilians. The Afghan War Log reported the deaths of over 91,000 civilians.
In addition to the videos, the Guantanamo Bay Files and the War Logs, 251,287 diplomatic cables were leaked, exposing US spying on the United Nations as well as allied nations from 1966-2010. It was also revealed that the US State Department backed giant corporations like Nike and Nautica who blocked a proposed increase in the Haitian minimum wage in 2009, a country long ravaged by poverty and famine.
But arguably the most horrifying of the crimes leaked by Manning was the alleged involvement of US contractor DynCorp in child trafficking and providing children as entertainment for a sex party for Afghan security recruits. In multiple reports, boys between the ages of 8-15 were forced to dance for men and afterward were purchased for sex. The Guardian reported that two Afghan policemen and nine others were arrested for "purchasing services from a child." Dyncorp faced similar allegations in 1999 in Bosnia when whistle blower, Kathryn Bolkovac, a UN Police Monitor accused Dyncorp employees in Bosnia of selling and having sex with minors. She was fired by DynCorp but filed an unfair dismissal case in Great Britain and won.
Manning was convicted on July 30, 2013 of 17 charges including espionage and theft, but acquitted of aiding the enemy. Manning was sentenced to 35 years in prison.
On August 22, 2013, Manning released a statement saying that she is a transgender person and considers herself to be a woman. She requests that she be referred to as Chelsea Manning going forward.
Within minutes American mainstream media, in an obvious attempt at sensationalism and ratings grabbing began asking people on the street if they thought taxpayers should have to pay for Chelsea's hormone therapy. Not a single person was asked their opinion on tax payer funded torture, the detention and massacre of innocent civilians, or the sex trafficking of children. Instead, the mainstream media chose to focus on the personal life of Chelsea Manning, who as one of the over 700,000 transgender Americans now finds herself in possibly the most vulnerable group in America, second only to whistle-blowers it seems.
It is incorrigible for politicians and so-called journalists to distract the world with Chelsea Manning's personal situation when Americans urgently need to address the issues Chelsea brought to light, and to consider the fate of the whistle-blowers whose sacrifices do not endanger, but ensure our freedom. She gave up her freedom to expose horrible atrocities upon human beings that demand investigation. And for that, she is a hero.
Paul Craig Roberts explains that the serial liars U.S. President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry are finally being held to account by world public opinion for the death and destruction they have inflicted upon Syria, Libya, Iraq and Afghanistan. However, unless they are tried for their crimes at the International Criminal Court at the Hague, there can be no enduring peace.
Editorial comment
Unlike what occurred on past occasions when the U.S. Government launched wars against the people of Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, much of world public opinion, including majorities within the U.S. and within many countries, whose governments are allied to the U.S., are opposed to its planned war against Syria and have organised effectively to prevent it #fnSubj3" id="txtSubj3">3
Also, there are a number of honest and principled world leaders, who have substantial resources and who are willing to use those resources to stand up to the world's bullies. One is Vladimir Putin, President of Russia, who has been supplying Syria with many of the armaments necessary to defend itself against the West's proxy terrorists and threatened invasion by Western Nations.
Others include the leaders of Iran and the BRICS nations including many governments of Latin America.
That Putin was able to expose U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry before the world for the liar that he is #fnSubj5" id="txtSubj5">5 was because of his profile and that the Russian and other Governments have set up media outlets which are able to tell the truth to a large proportion of the world's population who would otherwise have their views largely moulded by presstitute media.
The Australian government has acted barely less shamefully
Much of what Paul Craig Roberts has written of Barack Obama and John Kerry is also true of Australian 'Labor' Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, and Senator Bob Carr, the Australian Minister for Foreign Affairs. Australia's role in inflicting harm on the peoples the world in recent years has been largely overlooked. As an example, nowhere in former U.S. Congresswomen Cynthia McKinney's book about Libya#fnSubj4" id="txtSubj4">4, is Kevin Rudd's shameful role in starting the NATO invasion of Libya in 2011. #fnSubj6" id="txtSubj6">6 As 'roving' Australian Foreign Minister in the Middles East in March 2011, Kevin Rudd called for the establishment of the "no-fly" zone, because it was deceitfully reported the Libyan Air Force was indiscriminately bombing civilians.
Since then Kevin Rudd and Bob Carr have done much to help start a new war against Syria They have also spread lies similar to those told by Kerry and they have taken diplomatic initiatives to help start the war. Fortunately for Syria and the world, their hard efforts appear to have come unstuck thanks to the weight of world public opinion in support of Syria.
Does the American public have the strength of character to face the fact that the US government stands before the entire world revealed as a collection of war criminals who lie every time that they open their mouth? Will Congress and the American public buy the White House lie that they must support war criminals and liars or "America will lose face"?
The obama regime's lies are so transparent and blatant that the cautious, diplomatic President Putin of Russia lost his patience and stated the fact that we all already know: John Kerry is a liar. Putin said: "This was very unpleasant and surprising for me. We talk to them [the Americans], and we assume they are decent people, but he [Kerry] is lying and he knows that he is lying. This is sad.#fnSubj1" id="txtSubj1">1"
When Secretary of State Colin Powell was sent by the criminal bush regime to lie to the UN, Powell and his chief of staff claim that Powell did not know he was lying. It did not occur to the Secretary of State that the White House would send him to the UN to start a war that killed, maimed, and dispossessed millions of Iraqis on the basis of total lies.
The despicable John Kerry knows that he is lying. Here is the American Secretary of State, and obama, the puppet president, knowingly lying to the world. There is not a shred of integrity in the US government. No respect for truth, justice, morality or human life. Here are two people so evil that they want to repeat in Syria what the bush war criminals did in Iraq.
How can the American people and their representatives in Congress tolerate these extraordinary criminals? Why are not obama and John Kerry impeached? The obama regime has every quality of Nazi Germany and Stasi Communist Germany, only that the obama regime is worse. The obama regime spies on the entire world and lies about it. The obama regime is fully engaged in killing people in seven countries, a murderous rampage that not even Hitler attempted.
Whether the criminal obama regime can purchase the collaboration of Congress and the European puppet states in a transparent war crime will soon be decided. The decision will determine the fate of the world.
As for facts, the report released to the UN by the Russian government concludes that the weapons used in chemical attacks in Syria are similar to the weapons in the hands of al-Nusra and are different from the weapons known to be possessed by Syria. #fnSubj2" id="txtSubj2">2
The obama regime has released no evidence to the UN. This is because the criminal regime has no evidence, only made up fairy tales.
If the obama regime had any evidence, the evidence would have been released to British Prime Minister david cameron to enable him to carry the vote of Parliament. In the absence of evidence, cameron had to admit to Parliament that he had no evidence, only a belief that the Syrian government had used chemical weapons. Parliament told Washington's puppet that the British people were not going to war on the basis of the Prime Minister's unsubstantiated belief.
Are the American people and the rest of the world just going to stand there, sucking their thumbs, while a new Nazi State rises in Washington?
Congress must vote down the war and make it clear to obama that if he defies the constitutional power of Congress he will be impeached.
If the US Congress is too corrupt or incompetent to do its duty, the rest of the world must join the UN General Secretary and the President of Russia and declare that unilateral military aggression by the US government is a war crime, and that the war criminal US government will be isolated in the international community. Any of its members caught traveling abroad will be arrested and turned over to the Hague for trial.
#fnSubj3" id="fnSubj3">3. #txtSubj3">↑ Many, who are opposed to war, nevertheless still accept many of the lies fed to them by the presstitute media. To the extent that they do, their opposition to the war can only be muted. As one example, many accept the unsubstantiated view atrocities are being committed by both sides of the conflict. Others choose to promote the view that President Bashar al-Assad is corrupt, but invariably fail to provide evidence when challenged. In time, more and more people will come to understand that these views are wrong.
#fnSubj4" id="fnSubj4">4. #txtSubj4">↑ The Illegal War on Libya (Clarity Press, 2012) by Cynthia McKinney.
Despite being officially launched in 2010, it's the 7th of September 2013 that will see the real birth of the 'population party'. William Bourke, the leader of the Party, says, "We champion a difficult but critical cause - misunderstood by some, and misrepresented by others. Despite the huge challenges of running a national campaign on a shoestring budget, our grassroots community party has collectively run an honorable and professional campaign. We have much to be proud of."
Australia's sustainable choice
Tomorrow Australians face a critical decision.
Either they allow the tri-partisan population explosion that's pushing Australia to 40 million people by 2050, or they vote to slow down and stabilise at around 26 million.
Australia has a chance to lead by example on this critical global issue, and to partner and support other nations for our collective benefit.
The Stable Population Party offers a sensible and responsible path that will permit Australians to fulfil their primary and overwhelming moral responsibility - to pass on a sustainable Australia.
How-to-vote card
Please print and share our national how-to-vote card: CLICK HERE
Please also forward this article to relevant people in your network (via BCc rather than an open email), to help build awareness for the Stable Population Party, and particularly for the Senate vote in all eight states and territories.
Every single Australian has a choice to Vote [1] Stable Population Party for The Senate.
A sustainable Australia starts with a stable population.
"Growth isn’t always progress: Our planet is not an inflatable ball & has limited resources. It’s great to watch our children or income grow, but every growth has a limit. Beyond it lie greed, overpopulation, environmental destruction, conflict & misery. Ever-growing population & industries wouldn’t make life better, but surely lead to imminent catastrophe. Unlike many mad/blind economists & politicians, I’ll work for preserving the current population levels & the development of cleaner, sophisticated & sustainable steady state economy."
Inspired by the new on-line voting sites that allow you to practice and research your vote before the big day, I've been looking at what's on offer in my own electorate, which is Dunkley. I will, of course, be voting below the line for the Senate, but I am keen to find some alternative to the usual suspects. In previous years I've not found any joy in the choices, however this year there is an independent running in Dunkley for the House of Representatives who seems interested in kindness to other creatures, conserving natural amenity and in containing growth. For this reason I am publicising his blog, which you can connect to here: https://www.facebook.com/156682354535525/posts/156906901179737 and I have transcribed it below:
Vote for real change - Federal Elections 2013
August 20 at 2:40am ·
Dear voter
Like most of us, I’m appalled by the impotence of the major political parties and their inability to bring anything but more taxes, bureaucracy, spin, back flips, backstabbing & nonsense. I’ve watched this show for decades, but now realize that if we don’t challenge it, it may never change. While I’m seriously interested in social reform, I’m by no means a career politician or lawyer. I’m an engineer. From my purely technical point of view our current political system is no better than a steam engine. It makes lots of noise, fire & smoke but has less than 10% efficiency. It’s outdated!
If elected, I’ll do my best to build a prosperous, progressive & peaceful nation led by caring, modern government.
Below are some of the key issues I strive for:
The republic
I’ll promote a fair referendum & do my best to dump the monarchy as obsolete & useless form of government. We’re one of the very last colonies in the world, but surely mature enough to be an independent nation & govern our lives without the “help” or the exuberant bills of the royals.
Abolition of the states
A tiny nation, the size of big Asian city doesn’t need states, territories & armies of bickering, often useless politicians. Having too many governments doesn’t make our life any better. Exactly the opposite: disorganized, very expensive & often wasteful. One & only federal government having less than half of today’s politicians will be infinitely more expedient, efficient, fair & affordable.
Five years government terms
Big social, environmental & engineering projects take many years to complete. They’re only successful if a team of dedicated people can manage them from start to completion. Our government is in charge of these projects, but has no time to focus. Minister or expert - it takes some time to learn a new job. Then usually comes the next party leadership challenge & the compulsory cabinet reshuffle - back to the beginning, one more time... By the time the ministers know what they’re doing - it’s election time again. Time to forget the big projects & focus on getting votes for another term. No wonder that here it takes half a century to deliver projects that in other countries are accomplished in just a few years. Increasing the terms of government to 5 years will vastly improve the efficiency of our government & bring us in line with the rest of the modern world.
Unicameral parliament
The two-house parliament we have now is modeled on the early Westminster, where lords & aristocrats could overrule the commoners any time they liked. If we’re to really embrace 21-st century’s definition of equality, we have to assume that everyone (member of the public, MP or senator) is equal. Merging the 2 houses of parliament (i.e. abolishing the senate) will make the whole legislative process much quicker, far more efficient, fair & definitely less costly. Parliaments have to make laws, not shows...
Foreign affairs
Many politicians still can’t learn that sending our troops to invade foreign lands doesn’t help democracy but only brings death & misery for all. Alliances, empires, armies, war, aggression & conquest would never set anyone free, nor make this planet a better place. Countless lives & billions of dollars were wasted in the name of British & American imperialism (think of Gallipoli, Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, Afghanistan...). Enough! Now is time to give peace a chance!
I’ll work for harmony & cooperation, not confrontation or dominance. Our world shall be governed by UN, not superpowers, NATO, Pentagon, Bilderberg, CIA or Wall St.
Healthcare
Everyone who ever needed medical care knows that our healthcare is not yet “world class”. I believe that the following measures will make us healthier & happier nation:
• Provide free dental care covered by Medicare
• Strengthen the Medicare system & stop pushing people into private health insurance
• Provide free ambulance service for everyone in need
• Build new hospitals &/or increase the number of beds in existing ones in areas where they’re needed
• Support better pay & work environment for health professionals – doctors, nurses, etc.
• Encourage organ & blood donation, medical & health literacy, education, research & technology
• Legalize euthanasia (covered by Medicare)
• Introduce affordable capped govt. medical indemnity cover for all health professionals
• Promote Zero drugs tolerance & random drug & alcohol testing in schools, work places, etc.
• Discourage drinking, smoking & obesity by ads, bans, restrictions & higher taxes
Education
We’ll never become a smart & prosperous nation while our schools are hampered by outdated thinking & poor standards. I’ll support the following solutions which will give our children the wisdom to build a brave new world:
• National curriculum & education standards with focus on work, science, humanities & technology, not just sport, entertainment or dogma
• Free university/tertiary education (ATAR-based)
• Equal funds for every student (nation-wide)
• Free text books for primary & secondary students
• Support national tests, school assessments & ratings
• Introduce flexible school terms & holidays
• Canteens offering healthy food at affordable prices
• Promote higher standards & fair pay for teachers
• Improve discipline & eradicate bullying
• Free pre- & after school care (07:00 – 19:00)
Environment
I’ll do my best to protect Mother Nature by:
• Retiring all dirty coal power stations within a decade & build cleaner, economically viable alternatives
• Stop logging in old growth forests
• Ban exploration by hydraulic fracturing (fracking)
• Protect our parks, rivers & seas from disposable glass & plastic packaging by introducing bottle deposits
• Commit to realistic global CO2 reduction targets
• Reduce car registration for small & fuel-efficient cars
• Protect all wildlife & limit animal farming, racing, pet trade, cruelty & slaughter
• Reduce our dependence on animal & forest products
• Expand marine & national parks, remove all entry fees
Defense
Global peace, democracy & prosperity will never be a reality if we continue to arm, train & keep armies, navies & air forces. Burning our hard-earned tax dollars by acquiring new, trillion $$ fighter jets, frigates, submarines & the likes will never make us more secure or “friendly” nation, but shall only bring us a step closer to the end of the human civilization. Instead of digging our graves & lining the pockets of arms producers & dealers, our money can sponsor much more humane initiatives outlined in other paragraphs. As a devoted pacifist I’ll work for:
• Drastically reduce & soon eliminate our exuberant military expenditure
• Quit NATO, ANZUS and similar military alliances
• Close military training institutions & soon (within few years) disband army, air force & navy
• Close espionage & secret security agencies such as ASIO, ASIS, DIGO, DIO, IGIS, ONA, etc.
• Provide ex-defense & intelligence staff with peaceful civilian jobs (e.g. build a capable Federal Emergency Service able to fight natural disasters like bush fires, floods, hurricanes, earthquakes, etc.- home or abroad)
Law & order
Over the last century our society made a tremendous leap from one of the worst places on earth to a developed & civilized nation. Despite this huge achievement there is a lot of work to be done until we uproot the crime culture inherited from the penal colony days. For this to happen we need to close the loopholes in our legal system & change our attitude towards crime. Our laws are still very lenient & convoluted, while jails & courts are outrageously expensive. Instead of fixing these problems our governments & police are much happier to book each of us for driving at 3 km/h over the limit, rather than chasing real criminals. We also have to stop the suffocating violence invading our media, movies & computer games before it’s too late. Lawlessness, bike gangs, hooligans, drug dealers, graffiti & vandalism also pose huge problems which need tough & urgent countermeasures
Taxation
Our tax system is incredibly hungry, complex & ineffective. I’ll encourage a simpler & fairer system that will:
• Promote (by lowering the company tax rate to 25%) socially & environmentally responsible businesses
• Discourage socially corrosive industries such as alcohol, tobacco, gambling, tattoos, sex, etc
• Plug loopholes allowing many billionaires to pay less tax than factory workers
• Freeze the overall tax rate & reduce the number of taxes
• Increase the tax-free threshold to $25 000
• Increase the tax rate for incomes > $1M to 90%
• Promote health by abolishing the Medicare levy for people who have a healthy lifestyle (e.g. use no drugs, alcohol, tobacco & aren’t overweight)
• Make ATO exclusive (sole) tax & rates collector
Growth isn’t always progress
Our planet is not an inflatable ball & has limited resources. It’s great to watch our children or income grow, but every growth has a limit. Beyond it lie greed, overpopulation, environmental destruction, conflict & misery. Ever-growing population & industries wouldn’t make life better, but surely lead to imminent catastrophe. Unlike many mad/blind economists & politicians, I’ll work for preserving the current population levels & the development of cleaner, sophisticated & sustainable steady state economy
Welfare
I’ll work for a fair, efficient & helpful system based on:
• Providing real (govt. & private) jobs for everyone who wants to work (think of Roosevelt’s (FDR) New deal)
• Reform Centrelink & hugely reduce staff, queues, size, bureaucracy, time & career-wastage
• Get rid of parasites, useless formalities, job clubs, networks, agencies & “training” institutions
• People who still have no job (despite the above) shall get the dole in their bank accounts without queuing/reporting
• Ensure that dole isn’t used for gambling, alcohol, smokes & similar unwise products or services
• Make welfare benefits independent of marital status – the current system unfairly penalizes families/couples by providing more benefits for singles
Industrial reform
It’s no secret that with just a few exceptions most of our industry is in crisis. In order to get it out of the doldrums, increase productivity & attract more investment we need to consider radical improvements like:
• Introduction of 7 day working week where individuals & businesses can decide if & when they want to close or have their 2 or more weekly days off (incl. flexible holidays letting each of us to celebrate different occasions on different days of the year) These will allow most businesses to operate 365 days/year
• Complete overhaul of the 457 Skilled Working visa often used to undermine established wages & conditions
• Ease the burden of excessive red tape, costs & bureaucracy of compulsory insurance, licensing & OHS
Retirement
Our retirement age is amongst the highest in OECD but many politicians are openly talking of 70 or more.
Would there be any retirement after another decade or two? Can we work until death? I’ll do my best to bring retirement age back to 65, provide equal benefits for all retirees (disregarding of sex & marital status) & let older people enjoy their hard earned retirement.
Last but not least
You may call me radical, heretic, or a dreamer, but I’m certainly not a spin doctor or hypocrite. I use plain English, simple maths & sharp pencil. None of the above solutions is based on running a budget deficit, borrowing money or selling the country to a wealthy neighbor. They can be a reality tomorrow if you have an open mind & can think outside the square. Unlike professional politicians, I have no sponsors pulling the strings behind the scenes. I pay my bills & fight for our ideas. Together we can build a better world and your vote will bring us a step closer!
Thank you
Election day volunteers wanted – please contact me on
Mob 0421 328 629 * [email protected] * 4 Wilson Gv Seaford 3198
For the first time ever right across Australia ( except NT and Tas) Australians will at this election have the opportunity to vote for a party dedicated to animals. At a recent presentation by the AJP in Victoria, I found out that their principle policy is 'kindness'.
You may know the recently formed Animal Justice Party from their efforts to stop the kangaroo slaughter in the ACT or other actions such as opposing the live trade. They were however formed to enhance the lives of all animals as can be seen from the policies on their web site Animal Justice Party.
If you want to know how AJP preferences work for the Senate please read their explanation below:
1. The AJP has preferenced other parties on the Senate Group Ticket so as to maximise its chances of having candidates elected. This is the best way you can use your vote to help animals.
2. We are required by the AEC to preference every party. Giving minor parties the highest preference gives us the best chance of winning when the votes are counted.
3. Parties that have policies that support animals have been preferenced highest by the AJP. Parties with policies and practices that support animal cruelty have been preferenced lowest by the AJP.
4. AJP preferences vary in each jurisdiction according to the performance of each party on animal cruelty matters. For example, we have put the Greens last in the ACT because of their active support of kangaroo brutality in that jurisdiction. On the other hand, we have put the Greens mid-field in Western Australia and South Australia because of their active support for banning the horrendous live trade in farm animals.
5. In all cases except in the ACT we have preferenced Greens ahead of the major parties.
6. If you want to vote above-the-line for the AJP, then simply follow the AJP Senate How to Vote Card (vote 1 above the line). Of course you can always vote below-the-line for the AJP if you want to preference the other parties and candidates in a different way.
I watched her at the Supreme Court Case over Orrong Towers and admired her ability to sit unpaid through hours and hours of barrister-speak for the pure benefit of her community. Such a contrast to observing the antics of our paid, mosty male, parliamentarians.
Margot Carroll gets Mayor’s Award of the Year 2013 for outstanding voluntary service to the community
Margot is a long-term resident of Stonnington who has been actively involved in community issues for about 30 years. She is extremely passionate about preserving Melbourne’s Heritage and livability from inappropriate developments.
One of her biggest battles in recent times was to stop the over development at 590 Orrong Road in Armadale. (See "http://candobetter.net/?q=node/3257.")She has worked tirelessly to ensure the community’s voice on this issue was heard. The battle is now in its fourth year, and throughout the entire time, Margot has demonstrated exceptional leadership and negotiation abilities – and was not prepared to give up.
Under her skillful leadership, Margot has helped prove that the Stonnington community is serious when it comes to protecting the character of the local area and shopping inappropriate development.
Margot has helped bring the community together over the issue, and is prepared to keep fighting until a favourable result is received."
Margot's importance and example extends well beyond Stonnington.
The Mental Health Nurse Incentive Program (MHNIP) funds mental health nurses to work collaboratively with GPs and psychiatrists to support people with severe and persistent mental illness. This is a very economical and efficient collaboration, funded by Medicare and bulk-billable. It usually costs patients nothing, in contrast to the unaffordability of consultations with psychiatrists and the limited availablility of funding for psychologists. The Australian College of Mental Health Nurses (ACMHN) welcomes the release of Government and Coalition election policies on mental health, but College President Prof Wendy Cross has expressed concern that the Mental Health Nurse Incentive Program (MHNIP) was not mentioned by either party. The ACMHN calls on whoever forms the next Australian Government to match the funding committment of the Greens, who put the figure of $210 million over three years.
“The MHNIP is a successful program that keeps people with complex mental illness out of hospital. It helps them live productive, self-directed lives” says Prof Cross.
A re-elected Labor Government will commit $83 million to address mental health priority areas, which it says are headspace, Lifeline, and supporting new and existing workplace mental health and suicide prevention initiatives.
Should the Liberal Party get elected, they will establish a National Centre for Excellence in Youth Mental Health, task the National Mental Health Commission with evaluating all existing mental health programs, continue to support the expansion of headspace centres and provide the Young and Well Cooperative Research Centre with $5 million to establish an e-health platform that will bring together a wide range of existing services.
Neither party mentions the MHNIP in their plans, which the ACMHN finds disconcerting and illogical, considering the successful outcomes identified by the government’s 2012 evaluation.
The MHNIP funds mental health nurses to work collaboratively with GPs and psychiatrists to support people with severe and persistent mental illness. The Program was capped in May 2012 and access for new medical practices has been limited. Current funding allocations in the forward estimates are insufficient to meet existing service levels.
“The Greens committed $210 million over three years towards the MHNIP. An extra $70 million per year will allow the services provided to be accessible to many more vulnerable Australians”, CEO of the ACMHN, Adjunct Associate Professor Kim Ryan said.
“We repeat our call for all major parties to commit to the continuation and growth of this vital program”, said Ms Ryan. “We call on whoever forms the next Australian Government to match the funding commitment of the Australian Greens”.
Source: Media release: Kim Ryan, CEO Australian College of Mental Health Nurses 02 6285 1078
In 1996, on the sixtieth anniversary of the last Tasmanian tiger’s death in Hobart Zoo in 1936, 7 September was declared ‘National Threatened Species Day’ — a time to reflect on what happened to the thylacine and how similar fates could await other native plants and animals unless appropriate action is taken.
Image: Numbat, Perth Zoo, Western Australia
Image: Thylacines at the Beaumaris Zoo in Hobart, 1910.
On the same day as the Federal Elections, it is perhaps significant that conservation and biodiversity programs are at risk.
In the central highlands of Victoria, about an hour and a half drive away, are the remnant mountain ash forests where the state’s Fauna emblem lives – the endangered Leadbeaters Possum, currently being assessed for upgrading the status as critically endangered. Who we elect to govern us after Threatened Species Day could well determine the future survival or extinction of species.
Leadbeaters Possum, Victoria's faunal emblem, could be extinct in 20 years unless logging pressure is removed. The Helmeted Honeyeater, our Victorian State bird emblem, is also under threat from loss of habitat. The Yellingbo and Tonimbuk reserves (where this species lives) are slowly dying from changed water flow regimes.
Australia's landscapes and species have been severely impacted by over 200 years of habitat loss and fragmentation. The impacts of land development, introduced plants and animals, grazing, salinity, changed fire regimes, pollution, and a changing climate all place additional pressure on our threatened species and their shrinking habitats.
National lists of threatened species, threatened communities, threatening processes and the recovery plans that are supposed to underpin action are out of date and inconsistent. Too often, governments turn their failure to properly monitor species decline into an excuse to do nothing on the grounds that they do not have sufficient information.
Conservation Council of WA Director Piers Verstegen said, “Right now, the WA Government’s logging agency is completely exempt from both State and Commonwealth laws designed to protect endangered wildlife such as numbats and black cockatoos.
“This leaves us in the appalling situation where the logging industry can clear fell whole forests with no legal protections for the endangered wildlife that depends on them for survival.
“The numbat is WA’s state mammal emblem and yet there are fewer than 1,000 left in the wild , which is around half the number of surviving giant pandas. We can’t afford to lose any more numbats or black cockatoos to the highly destructive logging industry.”
#sthash.pKiSP9BG.dpuf">Australia is grossly underfunding biodiversity conservation. The carbon pricing package that Julia Gillard negotiated with the Greens and independents included the establishment of a $1 billion fund for biodiversity programs. Rudd recently axed A$213 million for biodiversity conservation in the carbon price shake-up.
Coalition environment spokesperson Greg Hunt has announced the appointment of a Commissioner for Threatened Species if his side is elected, but no additional biodiversity funding. The Coalition is also promising to give away Commonwealth power to the states via a one-stop shop for all environmental approvals. Without power and resources, the commissioner is window-dressing.
WWF-Australia Director of Conservation Dr Gilly Llewellyn said that (2012) “It’s now over 70 years since the last Tasmanian tiger died in captivity and we are witnessing the possible winding back of crucial environmental laws, which will leave our threatened species even more vulnerable to the impacts of major projects like dams, coal-ports, mines and greenfield housing developments.”
Australia has 55 extinct animal species, 42 extinct plants and 1694 nationally threatened species. Australian species currently on the Critically Endangered list include:
• The orange-bellied parrot – reduced to less than 50 birds in the wild;
• The eastern grey nurse shark – reduced to around 500 individuals left in the wild;
• The bridled nailtail wallaby – estimated to be between 400 and 600 left in the wild;
• The speartooth shark – reduced to less than 250 individuals in the wild;
• The Gilbert's potoroo – reduced to less than 50 individuals in the wild.
Ironically, the National Threatened Species Network that inaugurated the day is itself extinct. It was de-funded in 2006.
Since then, the federal government seems to have lost interest in threatened species. Successive state of the environment reports have highlighted the continuing decline of native plants and animals, and pointed to the glaring lack of systematic, long term monitoring – a concern echoed by the independent review of the federal environment laws.
A report in 2011 by three conservation groups, aptly titled Into Oblivion : the disappearing mammals of northern Australia, found that even in the vast and seemingly natural landscapes of northern Australia, mammals like quolls, bandicoots, possums and smaller wallabies are headed for extinction in the next 10-20 years unless we take action.
"It is now increasingly apparent that the conservation security assumed for or offered by northern Australia is rapidly eroding. Evidence of decline comes from a range of sources, including broad-scale inventory and comparison with historical records, large-scale formal monitoring programs,
extensive documentation of Indigenous knowledge, and targeted studies of individual species".
Of 1232 Australian bird species and subspecies, one-quarter would do badly when exposed to the effects of climate change later this century, the report finds.
It calls for funds now, for what would eventually be a $940 million program to safeguard birds from Cape York to Tasmania.
''A billion dollars over 50 years for conserving Australia's birds in the face of climate change is paltry compared to the cost of biodiversity loss,'' the 'Climate Change Adaptation Strategies for Australian Birds' report states.
The Animal justice Party supports the establish a new and fully funded National Endangered Species Program underpinned by a National Endangered Species Recovery Fund.
In the lead up to the Federal Election the major political parties have had the opportunity to provide their responses to Humane Society International questionnaire on environmental (and animal welfare) policy matters – click here to see how they responded.
President John F. Kennedy, Arabist and renowned for his support for Algerian Independence struggle
President Johnson, who colluded with Israel in its unsuccessful attempt to sink the USS Liberty and blame Egypt
Editorial Introduction: This article, by Laurent Guyénot, first published on Voltaire Net on 2 May 2013, covers critically important historical events which commenced with John F. Kennedy's Presidency (1961-1963) and ended with the 6 Day War of 1967. On 8 June 1967, the fourth day of the Six Day War, even though the United States was an ally of Israel, Israeli warplanes bombed the intelligence ship, the USS Liberty in the Mediterranean Sea and began strafing sailors in the water in an attempt to ensure that there were no survivors. The clear intention was to blame the sinking of the USS Liberty on Egypt and use that as a pretext for the United States to join Israel in its war against Egypt and other Arab nations.
The sinking of the USS Liberty was intended to be a classic false flag terrorist attack like 9/11 and in the mould of the Operation Northwoods proposal which had been put to former President Kennedy in March 1962 and rejected. However, the presence of witnesses on a nearby Soviet warship prevented the Israeli warplanes from finishing their work and foiled Israel's plan to attribute this crime to Egypt. This was done with the active collusion of U.S. President Johnson, who subsequently attempted unsuccessfully to cover it up. A war on a much larger scale -- potentially even an all out nuclear war -- was thus prevented. The criminality of the current President Obama and his Secretary of State John Kerry, who was recently caught out lying about Syria, has more than one chilling precedent 17 in the actions of President Lyndon B. Johnson (LBJ).
Exactly fifty years ago a crucial episode took place in the history of "U.S. democracy"; an epic struggle whose outcome would influence the future of the entire world. Laurent Guyénot revisits those events and recalls what was at stake at that critical historical juncture.
Kennedy and the AIPAC
In May 1963, the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations opened an investigation into the covert activities of foreign agents on U.S. soil, focusing in particular on the American Zionist Council and the Jewish Agency for Israel. #fnSubj1" id="txtSubj1">1 The investigation was prompted by a report from the Chairman of that standing Committee, Senator J. William Fulbright, written in March 1961 (declassified in 2010), stating: "In recent years there has been an increasing number of incidents involving attempts by foreign governments, or their agents, to influence the conduct of American foreign policy by techniques outside normal diplomatic channels." By covert activities, including "within the United States and elsewhere," Fulbright was referring to the 1953 "Lavon Affair" #fnSubj2" id="txtSubj2">2 , where a group of Egyptian Jews was recruited by Israel to carry out bomb attacks against British targets, which were to be blamed on the Muslim Brotherhood so as to discredit Nasser in the eyes of the British and Americans.
The Senate investigation brought to light a money laundering racket through which the Jewish Agency (indivisible from the State of Israel and a precursor to the Israeli Government) was channeling tens of millions of dollars to the American Zionist Council, the main Israeli lobby in the United States. Following this investigation, the Department of Justice, under the authority of Attorney General Robert Kennedy, ordered the American Zionist Council to register as "agents of a foreign government," subject to the requirements of the Foreign Agents Registration Act of 1938, involving the close monitoring of its activities.
This attempt to counter Israel's growing interference in U.S. politics undoubtedly enjoyed the support of the President. At the time when he was still a young journalist covering the United Nations inaugural conference, John Kennedy was troubled by Israel's ability to buy politicians, up to and including the President himself. By recognizing the State of Israel on May 15, 1948, (just ten minutes after its official proclamation) despite the unanimous disapproval of his government, President Harry Truman not only gained a place in biblical history ("Truman's historic act of recognition will remain forever inscribed in golden letters in the 4000-year history of the Jewish people", declared the Israeli ambassador), he also pocketed two million dollars to revitalize his re-election campaign. "That's why our recognition of Israel was rushed through so fast," Kennedy told his friend novelist and essayist Gore Vidal #fnSubj3" id="txtSubj3">3
In 1960, John Kennedy himself received a financial aid offer from the Israeli lobby for his presidential campaign. He decoded Abraham Feinberg's proposal for his journalist friend Charles Bartlett in the following terms: "We know your campaign is in trouble. We're willing to pay your bills if you'll let us have control of your Middle East policy." Bartlett recalls Kennedy's promise that "if he ever did get to be President, he was going to do something about it#fnSubj4" id="txtSubj4">4 Between 1962 and 1963, he submitted seven campaign finance reform bills but all were defeated by the influential groups they sought to restrain.
All government efforts to stymie the corruption of American democracy by Israeli agents were stopped short by Kennedy's assassination and his brother's replacement at the Department of Justice by Nicholas Katzenbach. The American Zionist Council evaded foreign agent status by dissolving and renaming itself American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). Ten years later (April 15, 1973), Fulbright commented on CBS: "Israel controls the U.S. Senate. [...] The great majority of the Senate of the U.S. -- somewhere around 80 percent -- are completely in support of Israel; anything Israel wants Israel gets." AIPAC continued the same practices, dodging any sanction even when its members were caught red-handed in acts of espionage and high treason. In 2005, two AIPAC officials, Steven Rosen and Keith Weissman, were acquitted after having received from a member of the Pentagon Office of Special Plans, Larry Franklin, documents classified as Secret-Defense which they transmitted to a senior Israeli official.
In 2007, John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt demonstrated in their book The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy that AIPAC and less prominent pro-Israel lobbies were the main cause of the war in Iraq and, more broadly, the determining factor in the foreign policy of the U.S. in the Middle East. Considering that nothing has changed, there is no reason to believe that the government of Benjamin Netanyahu will not also obtain from the United States the destruction of Iran that it consistently clamors for.
On October 3, 2001, Prime Minister Ariel Sharon was reported by Kol Yisrael radio to have said to his Foreign Minister Shimon Peres that "We, the Jewish people control America, and the Americans know it." His successor Benjamin Netanyahu gave a demonstration of that on May 24, 2011, before the U.S. Congress, when members of both houses stood up to cheer him 29 times, in particular after each of the following remarks: "In Judea and Samaria, the Jewish people are not foreign occupiers"; "No distortion of history could deny the 4000- year-old bond between the Jewish people and the Jewish land"; "Israel will not return to the indefensible boundaries of 1967"; "Jerusalem must never again be divided. Jerusalem must remain the united capital of Israel."
Kennedy, the bomb and Dimona
Had Kennedy lived, Israel's influence would most certainly have been curbed on yet another front, that of nuclear weapons. By the early 1950s, David Ben Gurion, who combined the functions of prime minister and defense minister, had engaged his country in the secret manufacturing of nuclear weapons, diverting the Atoms for Peace cooperation program, naively launched by Eisenhower, from its intended goals. Briefed by the CIA about the real purpose of the Dimona facility as soon as he moved into the White House, Kennedy put heavy pressure on the Israelis not to pursue it. He demanded that Ben Gurion open up Dimona for regular inspections, at first in person in New York in 1961, then through formal and increasingly insistent letters. In the last one, dated June 15, 1963, Kennedy urged that a first visit should take place immediately, followed by regular visits every six months, otherwise "This Government's commitment to and support of Israel could be seriously jeopardized#fnSubj5" id="txtSubj5">5." The reaction to this message was astonishing: Ben Gurion resigned on June 16, thus avoiding receipt of the letter. As soon as the new Prime Minister Levi Eshkol took office, Kennedy sent him a similar letter, dated July 5, 1963.
Kennedy's intention was not to deprive Israel of a power which was reserved to the United States and its NATO allies. The President's approach was part of a much more ambitious project, which he had announced on September 25, 1961, nine months after taking office, before the General Assembly of the United Nations: "Today, every inhabitant of this planet must contemplate the day when this planet may no longer be inhabitable. Every man, woman and child lives under a nuclear sword of Damocles, hanging by the slenderest of threads, capable of being cut at any moment by accident or miscalculation or by madness. The weapons of war must be abolished before they abolish us. [...] It is therefore our intention to challenge the Soviet Union, not to an arms race, but to a peace race - to advance together step by step, stage by stage, until general and complete disarmament has been achieved#fnSubj6" id="txtSubj6">6." The message was well received by Nikita Khrushchev, who responded favorably in a 26-page confidential letter dated September 29, 1961, delivered through secret channels. After the October 1962 Cuban missile crisis, the nuclear war that was narrowly avoided thanks to their composure brought the two heads of State even closer to the awareness of their shared responsibility to liberate humanity from the nuclear threat. Khrushchev sent Kennedy a second private letter in which he expressed the hope that at the end of Kennedy's eight years of presidency, "we could create good conditions for peaceful coexistence on earth and this would be highly appreciated by the peoples of our country as well as by all other peoples#fnSubj7" id="txtSubj7">7." Despite other crises, Kennedy and Khrushchev continued this secret correspondence, now declassified, comprising a total of 21 letters in which the intention to abolish nuclear weapons was a prominent concern.
In 1963, negotiations led to the first limited test ban treaty prohibiting nuclear weapon tests in the atmosphere, outer space and underwater, which was signed on August 5, 1963, by the Soviet Union, the United States and the United Kingdom. Six weeks later, on September 20, 1963, Kennedy manifested his pride and hope before the United Nations: "Two years ago I told this body that the United States had proposed and was willing to sign a limited test ban treaty. Today that treaty has been signed. It will not put an end to war. It will not remove basic conflicts. It will not secure freedom for all. But it can be a lever, and Archimedes, in explaining the principles of the lever, was said to have declared to his friends: 'Give me a place where I can stand and I shall move the world.' My fellow inhabitants of this planet, let us take our stand here in this Assembly of nations. And let us see if, in our own time, we can move the world to a just and lasting peace#fnSubj8" id="txtSubj8">8." In his last letter to Kennedy, handed to U.S. Ambassador Roy Kohler but which was never forwarded to the addressee, Khrushchev also took pride in this first historic treaty that "has injected a fresh spirit into the international atmosphere." He formulated other proposals, borrowing Kennedy's words: "Their implementation would clear the road to general and complete disarmament and, consequently, to the delivering of the peoples from the threat of war#fnSubj9" id="txtSubj9">9."
For Kennedy, the nuclear weapon was the negation of all historical efforts to civilize war by sparing civilians. He said to his friend and assistant Kenneth O'Donnell during his campaign for the Test Ban Treaty, "I keep thinking of the children, not my kids or yours, but the children all over the world." In his televised speech on July 26, 1963, he reiterated: "This treaty is for all of us. It is particularly for our children and our grandchildren, and they have no lobby here in Washington#fnSubj10" id="txtSubj10">10."
In the sixties, nuclear disarmament was a realistic goal. Only four countries had a nuclear weapon. There was a historic opportunity to be seized, and Kennedy was determined not to pass it up. "I am haunted by the feeling that by 1970, unless we are successful, there may be ten nuclear powers instead of four, and by 1975, fifteen or twenty#fnSubj11" id="txtSubj11">11," he uttered prophetically during his press conference of March 21, 1963. While all NATO member states and countries of the communist bloc were following the example of the USA and the USSR and taking a first step towards nuclear disarmament, Israel was acting secretly on its own, and Kennedy was determined to prevent it.
Kennedy's death a few months later eased the pressure on Israel. Johnson chose to turn a blind eye on the activities at Dimona. John McCone, the CIA director appointed by Kennedy, resigned in 1965, complaining of Johnson's lack of interest in the subject. Israel acquired its first bomb around 1967, without ever admitting it. Nixon was just as unconcerned as Johnson, while his National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger privately expressed his satisfaction at the idea of having friendly Israel as a nuclear ally. Nixon, who ushered the "deep state" into the White House so to speak, played a double game: at the same time as he publicly supported the 1968 Non-Proliferation Treaty (which was not a U.S. initiative), he sent a contradictory top-secret National Security Decision Memorandum (NSDM-6) saying: "There should be no efforts by the United States government to pressure other nations [...] to follow suit. The government, in its public posture, should reflect a tone of optimism that other countries will sign or ratify, while clearly disassociating from any plan to bring pressure on these countries to sign or ratify#fnSubj12" id="txtSubj12">12."
According to 2011 figures from SIPRI (Stockholm International Peace Research Institute), there are today across the world about 20,000 nuclear bombs with an average power 30 times that of Hiroshima, which equals 600,000 times Hiroshima. Of these, 1,800 nuclear warheads are on alert, i.e. ready to be launched in only a few minutes. With less than 8 million people, Israel is the world's sixth nuclear power.
"If the President had his way, there would be a nuclear war each week#fnSubj13" id="txtSubj13">13," Kissinger was reported to have said. In the 1950s, Nixon had recommended to Eisenhower the use of the atomic bomb in Indochina and Korea.
It was not until 1986, with the publication in the Sunday Times of photographs taken by Israeli technician Mordechai Vanunu inside Dimona, that the world discovered that Israel had secretly developed the atomic bomb. After being kidnapped by the Israeli secret services, Vanunu was convicted of the charge of "betraying state secrets." He spent 18 years in prison, including 11 in complete isolation. Since his release in 2004, he is prohibited from leaving Israel and communicating with foreign countries.
Johnson and the USS Liberty [#fnSubj16" id="txtSubj16">16]
Kennedy would not be remembered in Tel Aviv as a friend of Israel. In addition to his attacks against the outrageous lobbying activities of Israel and its nuclear power ambitions, Kennedy defended the right of return of the 800,000 Palestinian refugees expelled from their neighborhoods and villages in 1947-48. On November 20, 1963, his delegation to the United Nations called for the implementation of Resolution 194 crafted for this purpose. Kennedy probably never got the chance to read Israel's hysterical reactions in the newspapers: two days later, he was dead. Johnson's rise to power was greeted with relief in Israel: "There is no doubt that, with the accession of Lyndon Johnson, we shall have more opportunity to approach the President directly if we should feel that U.S. policy militates against our vital interests," considered Israeli newspaper Yedio Ahoronot. Far from reproaching Israel for its ethnic cleansing, Johnson fully embraced the myth of "a land without people for a people without a land", even going so far as to compare in front of a Jewish audience, "Jewish pioneers building a house the desert" with his own ancestors colonizing the New World - which, in fact, unintentionally underscored the equivalence between Israel's denial of its ethnic cleansing of Palestine, and the denial by the Americans of their own genocide history.
While Kennedy had cut down aid to Israel, Johnson increased it from 40 million to 71 million and to 130 million the following year. While the Kennedy administration had authorized the sale of a limited number of defensive missile batteries to Israel, under Johnson more than 70% of the aid was earmarked for military equipment, including 250 tanks and 48 Sykhawk offensive aircraft. Military aid to Israel reached 92 million in 1966, more than the total of all previous years combined. Conversely, by denying them U.S. aid, Johnson forced Egypt and Algeria to turn to the Soviet Union to maintain and upgrade their defense systems. In June 1967, Johnson gave Israel a "yellow light" for its so-called "preventive" war against Egypt, by a letter dated 3 June, when he assured Israeli Prime Minister Levi Eshkol of his determination to "protect the territorial integrity of Israel [...] and provide as effective American support as possible to preserve the peace and freedom of your nation and the area."
Kennedy's death deeply affected the Arab world, where his portrait graced many homes. "Now, De Gaulle is the only Western head of state on whose friendship the Arabs can rely," said Gamal Abdul Nasser. While reducing aid to Israel, Kennedy had generously provided grain to Egypt as part of the Food for Peace program. For that country, the short-lived presidency of John F. Kennedy will have been an enchanted interlude, a dream shattered all too soon. In 1954, under Eisenhower, Egypt had been the target of false flag terrorist acts perpetrated by Israel in order to "break the West's confidence in the existing Egyptian regime [and] to prevent economic and military aim from the West to Egypt#fnSubj14" id="txtSubj14">14," according to the very words of the head of military Intelligence (Aman) Benjamin Givli in a secret, today declassified, telegram. The accidental ignition of an explosive device led to the exposure of the conspiracy, sparking the scandal which became known as the "Lavon Affair" after defense minister Pinhas Lavon, a scandal which was quickly stifled by Israel and the United States. Prime Minister Moshe Sharett, who advocated a moderate brand of Zionism, respectful of international rules, acknowledged at that time (but only in private) the irresistible rise of extremists, among which he included future President Shimon Peres, who "wants to frighten the West into supporting Israel's aims"and that "raises terrorism to the level of a sacred principle#fnSubj15" id="txtSubj15">15."
Kennedy's death gave free rein to this Machiavellian terrorism which Israel has developed into an art form. Two days before the end of the Six Day War, the Israeli army launched against the USS Liberty the most famous and disastrous of its false flag attacks. On the sunny day of June 8, 1967, three unmarked Mirage bombers and three torpedo boats flying an Israeli flag bombed, strafed and torpedoed for 75 minutes this NSA (National Security Agency) ship -unarmed, floating in international waters and easily recognizable - with the obvious intention of leaving no survivors, machine-gunning even the lifeboats. They only stopped at the approach of a Soviet ship, after killing 34 crew members, mostly engineers, technicians and translators. It is assumed that if they had succeeded in sinking the ship without witnesses, the Israelis would have attributed the crime to Egypt, so as to drag the United States into war on the side of Israel.
According to Peter Hounam, author of Operation Cyanide: Why the Bombing of the USS Liberty Nearly Caused World War III (2003), the attack on the Liberty was secretly authorized by the White House as part of the project labeled Frontlet 615, "a secret political arrangement in 1966 by which Israel and the U.S. had vowed to destroy (Egypt's Gamal Abdel Nasser)." The orders issued by the White House that day, which delayed the rescue mission by several hours, suggest that Johnson not only covered up the Israelis post-facto, but also conspired with them. Oliver Kirby, the NSA Director for Operations at the time, reported to journalist John Crewdson of the Chicago Tribune (October 2, 2007) that the communications transcripts from the Israeli planes intercepted by the NSA and sent to Washington immediately, left no doubt as to the identity of the attackers, and about the fact that they were aware it was a U.S. target before the attack: "I'm willing to swear on a stack of Bibles that we knew they knew [that it was a U.S. ship]." Unmasked, Israel claimed it was a case of mistaken identity and offered its apology, which Lyndon Johnson meekly accepted on the grounds that "I will not embarrass our ally." When, in January 1968, Johnson received Israeli Prime Minister Levi Eshkol to Washington and then invited him to his Texas ranch, relations were cozy.
Israel will have drawn a lesson of impunity whose influence on its future behavior should not be underestimated: the price for failure in a false-flag operation against the United States is zero. In fact, failure is impossible, since the Americans will themselves step in to cover up Israel's crimes. Better yet, Johnson rewarded Israel by lifting any restriction on military equipment: weapons and U.S. aircraft immediately flocked to Tel Aviv, soon turning Israel into the top customer of the U.S. military industry.
#fnSubj17" id="fnSubj17">17. #txtSubj17">↑ Another precedent was President Johnson's war against the people of Vietnam, in which Australia participated. The false flag pretext, used to justify the escalation of the war and the aerial bombardment of Vietnam in 1964, was the fraudulent claim that the Destroyer USS Maddox had been attacked by Vietnamese warships off the coast of Vietnam in the Gulf of Tonkin.
Legal advice provided by deputy Senate clerk Richard Pye confirms the Senate has ''undoubted power'' to force Infrastructure Australia to hand over the documents, which the state government insisted must remain secret to protect delicate commercial negotiations.
The state government provided a cost-benefit analysis to Infrastructure Australia for the East West link, but it won't be available for public viewing because it's "commercially sensitive"
Transport Minister Terry Mulder patronisingly said making this information available to the public would affect the government's ability to negotiate the best outcome for taxpayers. Is he assuming the voting public do not understand finances, and what's best for their own hip pockets, and city?
According to Mulder, the east west link will be a major corridor for the movement of freight, which is forecast to increase by 50 per cent by 2020, along with the growth of people wishing to travel across the city. No doubt, this priority towards businesses and corporate supply chains makes the cost benefit analysis "commercially sensitive".
The Greens, who will continue to hold the balance of power in the Senate until at least the middle of next year when the term of the Senate expires, are battling to retain the seat of Melbourne where the east-west link is a key issue in Saturday's election.
''The east-west tollway is likely to be Victoria's next desalination project, with vast sums of taxpayer funds propping up a loss-making venture,'' Mr Bandt said.
The Greens fall down for not having an implementable and realistic population policy. The rapid growth in human numbers means we are in ecological overshoot with regards to fresh water supplies, and the energy and costs of the existing desalination plant is to cater for "projected" population growth - and property development. It's predicted that freight will increase by 50% over the next few years, due to population growth and demands. The tolls for using these freeways is because they are overly costly and over-budgets.
The Greens are failing the electorate by failing to address the cause of greenhouse gas emissions, pressure on natural resources, congestion hampering productivity, and budget blowouts. There's a big abyss of inconsistency in their idealist and borderless policies.
The Age newspaper, owned by Fairfax Media limited, reported on 4 September that Roger Corbett, 4 chairman of Fairfax Media said that Julia Gillard should have remained Prime Minister in preference to the "discredited" Kevin Rudd.
Mr Corbett said, "His colleagues sacked [Kevin Rudd] because they judged him to be incapable as Prime Minister."
The article continued:
'Referring to the damaging cabinet leaks that so badly derailed Ms Gillard's 2010 election campaign, Mr Corbett said: "[Mr Rudd], it's alleged, was active against the government during the elections. May be true, may not be.
'"I think that had a terrible effect upon Labor."
'The leaks led to a collapse in Labor's vote, which led to a hung parliament and forced Labor to enter into coalition with the Greens to form power. The Labor-Greens alliance has been a "very limiting factor" in the past three years, Mr Corbett said.
'And while this was going on, Mr Rudd himself had "destabilised" the Gillard government behind the scenes.'
Mr Corbett also praised Opposition Leader Tony Abbott. "[Mr Abbott's] a very sincere, nice type of human being, and I think he'll be very dedicated, focused in the job," he said.
Tony Abbott, whom Roger Corbett considers "a very sincere, nice type of human being", with less three days before polling begins and 10 hours before the pre-election media news blackout began at midnight on Wednesday, had still not released the costings for his policies, #fnSubj1" id="txtSubj1">1 plans to sack 7,000 Federal public servants. He also plans to give approval to the horrifically destructive East West Link project. #fnSubj2" id="txtSubj2">2
Candobetter and a number of other credible commentators can only agree with Roger Corbett's praise for Julia Gillard (if not with his praise for Tony Abbott).
June 2013: The now 'discredited' Kevin Rudd ousts Julia Gillard in Age-orchestrated putsch
"It is time for Julia Gillard to stand aside as leader of the federal parliamentary Labor Party, as Prime Minister of Australia, so that vigorous, policy-driven democratic debate can flourish once again. Ms Gillard should do so in the interests of the Labor Party, in the interests of the nation and, most importantly, in the interests of democracy. The Age's overriding concern is that, under Ms Gillard's leadership, the Labor Party's message about its future policies and vision for Australia is not getting through to the electorate. Our fear is that if there is no change in Labor leadership before the September 14 election, voters will be denied a proper contest of ideas and policies - and that would be a travesty for the democratic process.
"The Age does not advocate this lightly. We do so with all respect to Ms Gillard, ..."
Editor-in-Chief Andrew Holden, who wrote the editorial, also appeared in a short broadcast video (2:33) on the same page. He made the curious claim, with no supporting evidence. that it is necessary for Julia Gillard to stand aside "so that vigorous, policy-driven democratic debate can flourish once again."
Evidently, Andrew Holden does not wish for the debate to embrace the support given by Foreign Minister Senator Bob Carr and the Age newspaper to the United States' proxy terrorist war against Syria, which has cost, according to one estimate reported#fnSubj3" id="txtSubj3">3 in the Age, 100,000 Syrian lives since March 2011.
Why the Age newspaper itself could not have enabled the debate it claimed to have wanted, without meddling in the internal politics of the Federal Parliamentary Labor Caucus, was not explained.
The above argument was repeated in different guises:
"... [We are saying] Ms Gillard should stand aside ... because she has been unable to lift the party out of a desperately difficult political position. ...
"A big majority of the electorate appears to have stopped listening to Ms Gillard. Voters have been so distracted by internal and external speculation about Labor's leadership that efforts by the Prime Minister and her ministers to enunciate a narrative, a strategic vision, for the nation's future beyond this year have failed. ..."
Much of the editorial, in contrast to the self-fulfilling prophetic value judgements above, provided compelling reasons why Gillard should have remained Prime Minister and not been cast aside for Kevin Rudd :
'We ... [recognise] that in the three years she has occupied the office of Prime Minister - most of it under the vexing circumstances of a hung Parliament - Labor has implemented landmark reforms ...
'The polls in mid-2010 had indicated Labor was in danger of losing an election under Mr Rudd, and inside the party there was concern about his increasingly autocratic style. Ms Gillard said she challenged "because I believed that a good government was losing its way … I love this country, and I was not going to sit idly by and watch an incoming opposition cut education, cut health and smash rights at work". ...'
As Age Editor-in-chief Andrew Holden had demanded, Julia Gillard was subsequently ousted on 26 June and replaced by Kevin Rudd, but the promised improvement in Labor's approval rating never eventuated.
Age readers still to be given explanation
The Age is entitled to change its views, and is even entitled to promote views which may, through the course of events, prove to be mistaken. However, the public is entitled to be informed that what Roger Corbett said less than 3 days before the forthcoming Federal election is contrary to what the Age said on 22 June and why.
Unless this explanation is forthcoming, voters are entitled to assume that Roger Corbett's statements, ostensibly in support of former Prime Minister Julia Gillard, so late in the election campaign, are no more than a ploy to harm Labor's electoral prospects.
#update_5sep13" id="update_5sep13">Update, 8:36AM, Thur 5 Sep: Hockey to give costings today
The Agereports, "Shadow treasurer Joe Hockey will unveil the Coalition's election costings on Thursday, leaving voters just hours to digest the numbers while also refusing to say when the budget would be back in the black under his management."
"The timing of the Coalition's costings announcement comes after the electronic media blackout starting at midnight on Wednesday, which applies to all election campaigns. Labor will not be allowed to broadcast any television or radio commercials attacking cuts that may be contained in the documents." (emphasis added)
A poll in the Age article Hockey's 11th-hour costings asked "Should the Coalition have given voters more time to digest its costings?". The results of 5188 votes taken at 9:05AM were:
Yes: 69%
No: 27%
Not sure: 4%
Footnote[s]
#fnSubj1" id="fnSubj1">1. #txtSubj1">↑ The Herald Sun reported at 12:46PM on Wednesday, 4 September 2013, "The federal coalition is releasing its final policies on Wednesday (today) and will reveal its full costings 'very, very soon', Opposition Leader Tony Abbott says." Voters won't have sufficient time to digest the information and understand how it will affect them before they cast their vote on Saturday. (See also: #update_5sep13">Update of 9:10AM, Thursday 5 September, above.)
#fnSubj2" id="fnSubj2">2. #txtSubj2">↑ The construction of the East West Link would require the destruction of much of what remains of Melbourne's iconic Royal Park as well as many surrounding homes and will make Melbourne commuters even more dependent on private vehicles than they already are. It is not possible for the broader public to see the business case for the East West Link and compare it with the known business case for additional public transport because of "commercial in confidence" provisions in the East West Link contract.
#fnSubj3" id="fnSubj3">3. #txtSubj3">↑ As shown in Media Lies Used to Provide a Pretext for Another "Humanitarian War": Protest in Syria: Who Counts the Dead? of 25 Nov 2011 by Julie Lévesque in Global Research, the Western news media may have been exaggerating the number of dead for its own propaganda purposes. But, surely those opposed to war need to be able to accurately convey to the public, how many have been killed as a result of the support provided to the terrorists by Western nations? Nowhere on Global research could I find this figure. It certainly was not included in Professor Michel Chossudovsy's otherwise excellent Online interactive I-bookSyria: NATO's Next "Humanitarian" War? of 11 Feb 2012. Given that death toll of the Iraq wars since 1990 is certainly at least many hundreds of thousands and, according to one estimate could be a many as 3,300,000, including 750,000 children, the figure of 100,000 dead may not be such a great exaggeration, after all. Certainly should Barack Obama and John Kerry achieve their goals, the eventual death toll will be much higher than 100,000.
#fnSubj4" id="fnSubj4">4. #txtSubj4">↑ Roger Corbett subsequently admitted he was a member of the Liberal Party.
The Survival website says that the The Yanomami are the largest relatively isolated tribe in South America. They live in the rainforests and mountains of northern Brazil and southern Venezuela. The Brazilian congress is currently debating a bill which, if approved, will permit large-scale mining in indigenous territories. This will be extremely harmful to the Yanomami and other remote tribes in Brazil.
Today we heard the outcome of the Orrong Towers development case where Stonnington council went to the Supreme Court to try to have residents' and citizens' opinions heeded in planning what happens in their immediate environment. The Court completely failed to recognise this fundamental right to self-government. Having been present at the first hearing, I cannot imagine how this was justified and await the ratio dicendi.
Image: 107mm rocket shells frequently used by terrorists operating within and along Syria's borders. They are similar in configuration and function to those identified by the UN at sites investigated after the alleged August 21, 2013 Damascus, Syria chemical weapons attack, only smaller.
Help needed, and it won’t take but a moment of your time. Here in Macedon Ranges Shire we have a terrible council. It thinks it can operate and make decisions in isolation of and without consulting its community, while making the community pay for its decisions. Recently Macedon Ranges council took this culture a step too far. It deliberately resolved (not once, but twice) to apply for funding for a conference centre (and other large-scale development) at Hanging Rock and to not consult the community on the development or funding.
Hanging Rock does not belong to Macedon Ranges’ council officers and 5 of 9 councillors! It is an international icon; it belongs to the people of Macedon Ranges, Victoria, and Australia. Yet our council has shut everyone out. It’s making big decisions on our behalf – and on yours – without us having a say. We want our council to know this is not acceptable, and to rethink its decision.
Note that Mr Abbott's 2010 policy on population growth still amounted to wanting to have his cake and eat it, in the sense of wanting 'sustainability' but growth at the same time. He does say, however, that "Australia needs a population that our services can satisfy, our infrastructure can support, our environment can sustain, our society can embrace, and our economy can employ." Unfortunately he seems to want to leave the judgement of what this is up to the productivity commission, which seems to be entirely incompetent to assess ecological sustainability. Will Mr Abbott toe the line of his political promoter, the Murdoch Press, by keeping Australian targeted for continuing overpopulation, or will he use his big majority to carve out something more democratic? Clive Palmer, probably correctly, described Abbott as a 
The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, whose pronouncements on Syria have featured on candobetter.net recently, has authored today's editorial opinion for the New York Times, calling on the US not to invade Syria. Full text reproduced here.
A Plea for Caution From Russia
A few years ago I was introduced to Dr. Al Bartlett's "Arithmetic, population and energy" lecture recorded at the University of Colorado , (Boulder) U.S.A. To me, the message was so clear, engaging and logical that no-one could fail to understand it and hopefully none would fail to see the significance.
– He was saying that what may look to be ample reserves , for example, 500 years of coal still in the ground will not last anywhere near that as the demand for that resource increases with exponential population growth.
Despite being officially launched in 2010, it's the 7th of September 2013 that will see the real birth of the 'population party'. William Bourke, the leader of the Party, says, "We champion a difficult but critical cause - misunderstood by some, and misrepresented by others. Despite the huge challenges of running a national campaign on a shoestring budget, our grassroots community party has collectively run an honorable and professional campaign. We have much to be proud of."
"Growth isn’t always progress: Our planet is not an inflatable ball & has limited resources. It’s great to watch our children or income grow, but every growth has a limit. Beyond it lie greed, overpopulation, environmental destruction, conflict & misery. Ever-growing population & industries wouldn’t make life better, but surely lead to imminent catastrophe. Unlike many mad/blind economists & politicians, I’ll work for preserving the current population levels & the development of cleaner, sophisticated & sustainable steady state economy."
For the first time ever right across Australia ( except NT and Tas) Australians will at this election have the opportunity to vote for a party dedicated to animals. At a recent presentation by the AJP in Victoria, I found out that their principle policy is 'kindness'.
You may know the recently formed Animal Justice Party from their efforts to stop the kangaroo slaughter in the ACT or other actions such as opposing the live trade. They were however formed to enhance the lives of all animals as can be seen from the policies on their web site 
A candobetter.net article written in 2011 
The Mental Health Nurse Incentive Program (MHNIP) funds mental health nurses to work collaboratively with GPs and psychiatrists to support people with severe and persistent mental illness. This is a very economical and efficient collaboration, funded by Medicare and bulk-billable. It usually costs patients nothing, in contrast to the unaffordability of consultations with psychiatrists and the limited availablility of funding for psychologists. The Australian College of Mental Health Nurses (ACMHN) welcomes the release of Government and Coalition election policies on mental health, but College President Prof Wendy Cross has expressed concern that the Mental Health Nurse Incentive Program (MHNIP) was not mentioned by either party. The ACMHN calls on whoever forms the next Australian Government to match the funding committment of the Greens, who put the figure of $210 million over three years.
“The MHNIP is a successful program that keeps people with complex mental illness out of hospital. It helps them live productive, self-directed lives” says Prof Cross. 
President John F. Kennedy, Arabist and renowned for his support for Algerian Independence struggle
President Johnson, who colluded with Israel in its unsuccessful attempt to sink the USS Liberty and blame Egypt
Andrew Holden, Age Editor-in-chief
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