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sydney alternative media - non-profit community independent trustworthy
Friday, 18 May 2007
Aye there cabin boy Hartcher over yonder Capital deck, tis a scurvy day for plundering the tax purse, aye
Mood:  lyrical
Topic: big media

Pardon our reprise of talk-like-a-pirate day, as the rain patters down here in Sydney Town. Ain't it lovely.

We at SAM here wonder whether youngish Big Media blade Peter Hartcher - who like Stephen Mayne at crikey.com.au has the excellent capacity to see over the financial ramparts - has been stung into action by some stirring letters there at the Sydney Morning Herald today 18th May. Or maybe stung by our criticism Big Media including PH are pirates (just like Macquarie Bank) for amplifying matey corporate advertisers barracking for cruel AWA's. Or is PH simply taking corporate revenge with his column today on behalf of Fairfax against the govt for losing the AWA stoush beloved of corporate bean counters everywhere?

Indeed the dirty little secret of AWA's is that they have suppressed wages growth in a booming economy, as a sharp lad like Hartcher surely knows: Wages held down by IR laws - NEWS.com.au - 16 May 2007. If AWA are so good why are everyone's wages not growing with the profitability of the economy? Because it's a rip off obviously.

In our view that report of suppressed wages killed AWA's dead 2 days ago. Hence also our call for the Big Media commentariat to reveal their rare high AWA salaries while barracking for oppressive AWAs for everyone else on behalf of Big Capital/Govt/Media complex. 

The letter writers in the Herald today take umbrage at  the revealing but jarring opinion piece here only yesterday

  • Peter Hartcher: Macquarie's small bickies compared with big boys
  • pointing out no doubt accurately the home grown international pirate Macquarie Bank is small fish compared to the whale sharks on Wall Street, New York USA. '100 times our PM's salary' for their CEO is some 'small fish' apparently, but to make the point was always going to get Peter Hartcher a big reaction. And friction from us little guys.

    Now also today the bleeding hearts in the Fairfax readership have been appeased in quick measure with a 'look over there' cannon fire at the PM while he's down in the polls by Peter Hartcher; a Howard Hating piece dense with facts re $1.7 billion of govt advertising in the life of the Howard regime. Ouch. It's a cracking read too.

    Picture: PM Howard looks like he's in the crows nest of good ship Big Capital stuck in the canon sights of his critics, arms raised in surrender (adapted from Rocco, Sydney Morning Herald today)

    Here it is:

    Hey, big spender, that's our money

    PETER HARTCHER | Government use of taxpayers' money to propagandise for political causes is utterly unjustifiable. It shows contempt for taxpayers.

    But the sub text seems to be this: Big Capital are pirates with their crappy AWAs no one believes are generally fair. That's understood even in popular culture: mcleod's Daughters gets political

    Big Govt are pirates with their propaganda adverts at our own expense and doing Big Business dirty work - that's understood as above.

    And finally if you look through the gun smoke of real politik battle Big Media are pirates too: No matter how well senior journalists, even blades like Hartcher jig a sea shanty as a diversion with cracking political corruption stories like this one.

    For up until yesterday Big Media commentariat and the Govt were singing the same song as Big Corporates that AWAs were best for the economy and the people. But something went wrong in the chorus. As the ALP win the politics on AWAs with polling and lowly wage growth figures, the Big Media have effectively avoided transparency on their own motives from ultra hierarchical pay structure and cost cutting, while barracking for oppressive AWAs for everyone else. Suddenly the burning torch of transparency was getting way too close to their own backs as the govt case fell apart.

    The Big Media's moral exposure has only really emerged as they shifted to 'he said - she said' type reporting in the face of the ALP and the unions hanging tough.

    Yes the Herald piece by PH today does sledge a juicy advertiser in the govt party (on the way out) but that won't stop the govt advertising drip this election period so no problem there. And Hartcher still gives comfort to big business advertisers with:

    "...business has threatened to fund a campaign against Labor in this election campaign, which is surely its right"

    But let's be real here. Cabin boy Pete and the pirate crew in Big Media have been doing the advertising on AWAs sans election endorsement for Big Capital/Coalition Govt at least up until 2 days ago when the govt raised the white flag and virtually to half mast now. Lest the polls go even further down, down to Davy Jones Locker.

    Indeed Hartcher in this light virtually reads as a revenge story today with "unchain your anger" exhortation to voters in the last line, for the govt expensively losing the AWA argument and Fairfax cutting and running . Ouch again.

    And only now do we read this other letter today about AWAs/Work Choices, which is the burr under the skin of Hartcher and all his Big Media/Govt/Corporate colleagues now for lack of their own transparency. Indeed a dirty little secret obscured by sound and fury:

    By the by this writer lives on about $10K after tax per year. Perhaps its a fitting time to say "the workers united will never be defeated. Oi"


    Posted by editor at 1:55 PM NZT
    Updated: Saturday, 19 May 2007 1:07 PM NZT
    The tricky kangaroo meat debate - next course
    Mood:  incredulous
    Topic: health
    Sent: Friday, May 18, 2007 7:55 AM
    Subject: ....Re: partial grovel re hydatid life cycle BUT still many questions re kangas and public health

    I'm indebted to James Thomspon [below] for his sledge even though he mispells my name (Comments 16th May 2007) and partly grovel now re : "Eating red [kangaroo] meat does not result in hydatid infection."  I am no vet or medical man as such and it shows now half folding my tent on this one.  I had forgotten the dual life cycle of the creepy parasite from all those years ago in the lecture room. This diagram here Echinococcosis - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia, or here Echinococcus -- Encylopedic Reference of Parasitology shows the hydatid cyst in the kangaroo whether offal or meat is infectious to the 'definitive' dog stage of the life cycle, but not intermediate host like kangas or humans.The South Australian government web site also makes it clear "People cannot be infected by eating Hydatid cysts in infected offal & Humans cannot infect humans [sic]" Hydatid disease (SA) [pdf]. 

    Even so presence of hydatid is enough for sheep carcass to be rejected from an abattoir in WA 2006 presumably for hygiene/marketing reasons ESPERANCE REGIONAL OFFICE AGMEMO  and I still doubt eating one would be much fun if not dangerous directly. It would be another story if the pet bow wow ate it then licked, patted you. And the concern over quality control of meat on farm versus off farm (domestic v wild) is still not over: Anecdotally pet owners are cautious with "wormy" kangaroo meat: Dogz Online and EDBA Forums > Kangaroo Meat, and animal rights people still argue with some logic of other potential contaminants in off farm or wild animal situations here in NSW Parliament re chemical sprays Kangaroo Meat Contamination - 10/10/2000 - QWN.

    So I stand by the more general concern agricultural controls lessen risk compared with wild animal meat. For instance in meeting the sledge we found this submission [bold added] of Tony Pople and Gordon Grigg Dept of Zoology, Qld Uni for Environment Australia, August 1999 for the federal govt Overview of background information for kangaroo management - Chapter 7

    "Andrew (1988) reviewed the issue of kangaroo meat and public health, including the records of inspections between 1980 and 1987 made of carcasses by Australian Quarantine Inspection Service officers at export game meat establishments (this pre-dated the change of legislation in New South Wales in 1993). There were records for 204,052 red, eastern and western grey carcasses of which 196,104 were passed as fit for human consumption. Of the 7,948 rejected, 81% were rejected for reasons not associated with parasites or pathology, mainly poor handling, particularly inadequate refrigeration. Of the rest, only 1,452 were rejected because of a parasite, and that was for a nematode, Pelicitus roemeri, which is quite harmless, anyway, to humans, but is unsightly.... it is uncommon, but can infect the muscles of the lower leg.."

    Elsewhere the authors note people often prefer to cook kangaroo rare.

    We understand 3.6 m kangaroos are being 'culled' this drought year (usually 5 or 6 million per year). That's alot of dead kangaroo with no records. Nor is a study of 20 years ago, referred to in 1999 by govt, sufficiently recent for public confidence in 2007. The onus is on the industry not the other way round.

    Tom McLoughlin, ecology action

    James Thompson writes: Tom MacLouglin (yesterday, comments) has either misunderstood the mode of transmission of hydatids or he is deliberately attempting to mislead the public over the risk of eating kangaroo and other red meat. I agree that hydatid cysts are a potentially serious parasitic disease of humans. However, humans are at risk from the ingestion of hydatid tapeworm eggs, laid by tapeworms living in the gut of farm dogs, dingoes or foxes that had fed on cattle, sheep or kangaroos. To avoid human infection with hydatids, after handling dogs wash your hands before eating and worm your dogs regularly. Eating red meat does not result in hydatid infection. Tom should have paid more attention during his zoology degree.


    Posted by editor at 12:24 PM NZT
    Updated: Friday, 18 May 2007 3:02 PM NZT
    Local press south coast pick up the call to halt logger vandalism
    Mood:  crushed out
    Topic: ecology


     


    Posted by editor at 12:19 PM NZT
    Not so much lawyers in love, as lawyers in strife
    Mood:  blue
    Topic: health

    We received an intriguing letter from Lawyers Assistance Program yesterday not so much about high paid ambitious good looking 'lawyers in love', as the song goes here YouTube - Jackson Browne Lawyers in loveas lawyers in strife:

     

    We called up the LAP Co ordinator Richard Gulley who advises the letter

    1. is not related to a controversy running in crikey ezine at the moment about alleged drug use like footy players;

    2. they send to 18,000 every 2 years or so

    3. they get 2 or 3 calls per week from needy lawyers

    This letter comes coincidentally (?!) on the heels of

    - Big Media reports of depression in the profession especially in the younger cohorts leaving in droves apparently Lawyers most depressed: study | NEWS.com.au, and here Blake Dawson Waldron - Corrs Chambers Westgarth - Lander & Rogers ... and here Profession depression

    - claim and counter claim by senior lawyers in the crikey.com.au ezine of alleged drug use like cocaine in the profession, like every other section of society. Lawyers Weekly are onto the story here Depressed lawyers turn to alcohol and drugs and we know what they mean with my lawyer father being a victim.

    - official responses by the profession it's all under control and being monitored Lawyers row over drug use | Herald Sun

    Our comment: Drug use amongst any group of 18,000 humans? Der. And good luck to the LAP too. Working with unhappy people as lawyers'clients often are is bound to make you unhappy. We wonder how doctors manage. Glad we got out of mainstream legal work in 1991.


    Posted by editor at 11:43 AM NZT
    Updated: Friday, 18 May 2007 12:18 PM NZT
    Thursday, 17 May 2007
    Julian Armstrong, State forest public servant does the logger's PR in local paper Narooma News
    Mood:  down
    Topic: nsw govt

    Date: Thu, 17 May 2007 10:09:02 +1000
    To: narooma news
    From: harriett swift.....Subject: letter to the editor

    Julian Armstrong of Narooma (NNW 16/5) has written in support of logging the beautiful spotted gum forests at the foothills of Gulaga Mountain.
    He has a right to do so, but I think he also has an obligation to tell us that he is an employee of Forests NSW.
    Forests NSW spends $1.5 million a year on propaganda, which should be more than enough. Its employees should not be writing to the media as private citizens in their spare time without declaring who is paying them.
    Yours sincerely
     
     
    Harriett Swift
    Convenor


    CHIPSTOP campaign against woodchipping the SE forests, PO Box 797 Bega NSW 2550 Australia, http://www.chipstop.forests.org.au
    Pictures below: Gil Mathie, logging contractor leans on car bonnet (top) and watches (bottom) as police close up their paddy wagon after arresting another member of the local community Tuesday May 15th 2007. The day before Tilba Chamber of Commerce President Sol Ramana-Clarke was also arrested. One of Gil Mathie's crew was convicted of criminal assault against conservationists in 2006.


     

     


    Posted by editor at 2:18 PM NZT
    Updated: Thursday, 17 May 2007 2:43 PM NZT
    Get Up to get up our sad, sorry democracy in Oz Election 2007
    Mood:  a-ok
    Topic: election Oz 2007
    Sent: Thursday, May 17, 2007 12:49 AM
    Subject: Big decisions

    Dear friends,

    Right now we've got some big decisions to make, and we need to make them together, as a community.

    Sometime before the end of the year, Australians will go to the polls to choose the next government of our country. We all know how it works: the parties will posture, out-manoeuvre and outspend, while the pundits speculate and the voters alternate between trying to make sense of it all and just tuning out altogether.

    But for the first time there's something new in Australian politics this election year - you, the independent, connected movement of people for a progressive Australia. The next six months will be critical to our country's future, and we need your vote now to decide how we can best make a difference.


    http://www.getup.org.au/campaign/BigDecisions

    GetUp's people-powered experiment began just over 18 months ago, when few imagined anyone but wealthy donors, party power-brokers or media barons could change Australian politics. Since then we've worked together to help stop child refugees from being detained in Nauru, achieved the first major budget increase for the ABC in more than a decade and put the political spotlight firmly on the issues we care about - from climate change to Indigenous rights, justice for David Hicks and defending the voting rights of every eligible Australian.

    Lately we've been hearing from GetUp members across the country about why this election matters to you, and what sort of role you want us to play. These are big decisions; we can't make them alone, so we're making it easy for every GetUp member to be heard right now.  

    Tell us why you believe the next election is important to Australia, what issues you want us to focus on and whether we should sit on the sidelines of the election campaign - or take our collective gloves off to fight as effectively as possible for the issues we care about.

    http://www.getup.org.au/campaign/BigDecisions

    Thanks for speaking up,
     
    The GetUp team
     
    PS: We can't wait to hear from you so we can report back on your priorities and our next steps by early next week! Be quick to give us input and help set the course for our future now.


    Posted by editor at 2:00 PM NZT
    Stop press: Trioli ABC announcer does her job criticising Premier Iemma, accused of being a Liberal Party stooge
    Mood:  cool
    Topic: big media
     
    Picture: the 'ugly duckling' Virginia Trioli: The self described skinny nerdy dag as a child who grew into a swan as regards broadcasting in Melbourne and now Sydney.

    We felt compelled to send this report below on to the new media crikey.com.au ezine below and feel one qualification: It's an ALP town here and there are usually consequences for bucking the bully boys/girls of the ALP whether media, ngo or whatever.

    But it is also the only way to keep a clear conscience if not much of a career path we say with knowing experience. Will Trioli continue to fly along from her groovy perch there? We wonder. Certainly she has arrived as a power player in Sydney Town and as long as she exercises due responsibility with that power all should be well.

    The one concern with such as Trioli is that she may suffer excessive exuberance at times, with that sparkling voice and humour, at her undoubted success as a broadcaster, to as much a degree as Morris Iemma can be as boring or cynical as a wet cat. 

    We know this feeling of highs and lows - is it an Italian thing? - when emotional security is actually the goal in life. She sounds happy which is good for broadcasting and democracy in this city and this state. May it continue to be so, with a nod to Guiseppe De Lampedusa's The Leopard phenomenally good book on democracy of interest to a local book club recently.

    Sent: Thursday, May 17, 2007 9:36 AM
    Subject: breaking news Trioli takes on Iemma sleazy dead bat this morning

    Dear Crikey

    Virginia Trioli did her job on 702 ABC this morning in the sensitive pre 9 am segment, with maybe a bit of extra school mistress wood on Premier Morris Iemma for dodging a question about when he really knew an election promise was undeliverable (the Spit Bridge upgrade). Morris got a calm but determined scold for lack of real "conversation" as in lack of probity to his answers. We lawyers call it being "unresponsive" which can be grounds for contempt of court in the witness box, in this case the court of public opinion.

    Many callers apparently backed up the announcer's displeasure, but one Charles said she was biased to the Liberal Party because she never takes that approach with PM Howard.

    What we found amusing as a one time staffer at Media Monitors (2 years, 2000-2001) is that she milked this accuser for what seemed like ages but perhaps was only 3 minutes of airtime on the talkback making his articulate accusations.

    Now Trioli has rolled gold proof she is not an ALP, Greenie or Lefty stooge because she is 'biased' to the Liberal PM. Or maybe she was JUST DOING HER JOB - do yer reckon?! Clever how she milked the claim of reverse bias for all it was worth I thought.

    Tom McLoughlin, editor SAM news blog, ecology action sydney

    PS ... and no, you can't have her back, she's damn good.

    Posted by editor at 11:48 AM NZT
    Updated: Thursday, 17 May 2007 1:58 PM NZT
    Aye me hearties, and Peter Hartcher @ Sydney Morning Herald, it's talk-like-a-pirate day!
    Mood:  vegas lucky
    Topic: corporates

    Picture: The fog over Sydney today at right 17th May compared to same street last week at left, serves as a Shakespearean symbol for the attempt by journalist Hartcher to cloud the immoral extremely excessive Macquarie Bank salaries under fire this week.


    At the time of writing yesterday morning 16th May 2007:

    Macquarie Bank bosses paid 100x our political leaders just another name for corporate fascism
    Mood:  irritated
    Topic: corporates

    we didn't realise (believe it or not) that the front pagers of Sydney Morning Herald here

    The fineprint: a $33m pay cheque Bank boss Allan Moss is worth 669 graduate teachers or 108 prime ministers.  ...but you will pay their tax bill 

    and The Australian

    Treasurer can't share Mac bankers' glee | News | The Australian

    as pictured below 16th May 2007, both went the Big Sledge on sleazy Macquarie Bank with their huge salaries. To see these late last night was very heartening really because truly it is said the root of all evil is the love of money.

    We felt it was a big story courtesy of Stephen Mayne's piece in Crikey.com.au ezine a full 12 hours before the traditional press, and woke up keen to echo his work, having spent the night feeling beaten over the ongoing forest destruction in my state of NSW and East Gippsland  

    (Gulaga story immediately below, but also here Tuesday, 15 May 2007 Lib-Lab bullies and their logging/mining mates vandalise our local water catchments and our society index.blog?topic_id=1083693),

    and it seems the Big Media were on their production timeline in parallel with the same concerns about Macquarie.

    But Peter Hartcher, who we generally have a high regard for, get's it way wrong about moral values, if not Australian ones, in the Herald today here: Macquarie's small bickies compared with big boys.

    Not only does Macquarie prove there is a failure of moral values but by comparing with international rapacious capital of Wall Street all Hartcher is doing is explaining the economically cruel and unsustainable global business system that has led to vicious terrorist backlash, ecological collapse, and profound market failure via global warming. That's nothing to be proud of in Macquarie Bank the so called 'national champion' or the western world generally. The headline writers got it right yesterday, Hartcher get's it wrong today:

    But it does underline why even a talent like Peter Hartcher doesn't get it on why he personally should declare his own excessively generous AWA employment contract with Fairfax when commenting on industrial relations for average workers, as all other Big Media should to show they are doing the advocacy of big business hierarchy, a tone set by Macqurie bank. Hartcher is likely on $150-250K pa. We reported similar

    Big Journalist squawking and vandalistic clawing last Monday here

    14th May 2007 here index.blog?topic_id=1083701

    Senior journalists' egregious failure to declare their own huge AWA conflict of interest
    Mood:  sharp
    Topic: big media


    Posted by editor at 10:05 AM NZT
    Updated: Thursday, 17 May 2007 11:26 AM NZT
    Wednesday, 16 May 2007
    Community protest today in Batemans Bay re logger vandalism of the tourism coast
    Mood:  sad
    Topic: ecology


     

     


    Posted by editor at 8:57 PM NZT
    Updated: Wednesday, 16 May 2007 9:20 PM NZT
    Macquarie Bank bosses paid 100x our political leaders just another name for corporate fascism
    Mood:  irritated
    Topic: corporates

    When Premier Bob Carr quit his 'low paid' job in mid 2005 as elected Premier of NSW within weeks he was working for the main organ grinder in Sydney, NSW and Australia - Macquarie Bank, as here

    The Hon. Bob Carr joins Macquarie Bank as part-time consultant

    And the whole political community understood the significance, with leading citizens asking whether he didn't care about his reputation after politics anymore, and wide coverage:

    Stateline NSW

    Bob Carr joins Macquarie Bank - Business - Business - theage.com.au

    This confirmed the understanding of most experienced non government groups promoting the public interest here: That Macquarie runs land use, transport, planning policy.

    Bob Carr joins the Millionaire Factory Bob Carr

    Carr is one of a long line of very senior ex politicians who are on the Macquarie shill.

    The reason we have a million extra cars serviced by tollways and air pollution and massive congestion in Sydney is Macquarie Bank.

    The reason developers finance the major party gerrymander against authentic democracy is because of Macquarie's control of big planning decisions over infrastructure.

    This is the corporation that parades its philosophy as doubling their money by cutting a hole in a coin, two from one.

    And that's what they have done in NSW and Australia - cut the heart out of our democracy.

    Indeed as the documentary The Corporation makes very clear such entities as Macquarie Bank are psychopathic organisations exhibiting:

    • Callous unconcern for the feelings of others
    • Incapacity to maintain enduring relationships
    • Reckless disregard for the safety of others
    • Deceitfulness: Repeated lying and conning of others for profit
    • Incapacity to experience guilt
    • Failure to conform to the social norms with respect to lawful behaviors

    Of course they have PR trimmings to confuse the situation, just as any clever drug dealer donates to the local emergency ward, as here in combo with Mission Australia but it's a fascade in juxtaposition to the obscene salaries of their bosses.

    Crikey.com.au published this table yesterday that tells you in rare form who in effect is running the government, and the parliament, and the corporate media, on their salary and benefits close enough to 100 times bigger than the most senior politican. Even PM John Howard an avowed supporter of capitalism was moved to say on ABC World Today show yesterday 'its a very big amount of money':

    CHRIS UHLMANN: To another company, Mac Bank's announced its profit, and that's a great thing. But is Allan Moss, the head of that bank, worth $33.5 million?

    JOHN HOWARD: Well I think some executive salaries are over the top and I can understand the…

    CHRIS UHLMANN: Is that one?

    JOHN HOWARD: Well I… well $33 million is a lot of money isn't it? I mean -

    CHRIS UHLMANN: It's a lot more than you make, Prime Minister.

    JOHN HOWARD: Ah yes, but more importantly, it's a lot more than most people listening to this program make. And I mean, I am in favour of the capitalist system, I really am, and I don't think it's the business of government to put caps on people's salaries.

    But if you ask me as a citizen, do I think that's a lot of money, you bet I do. And I can understand why some people who are genuine battlers, and I'm not a battler, I mean I don't earn anything like that as you all know, but you know I have a comfortable salary, I'm not complaining.

    I'm more worried about people who're trying to raise a family on $40,000 or $50,000 a year. They're the people I worry about and they're the people that the Budget was directed to helping.

     

    Over to crikey here 15th May 2007 :

    Business

    26. Macquarie millionaires rolling in cash

    By Stephen Mayne, inventor of the Millionaires Factory moniker

    In what is probably the biggest remuneration report ever produced, pages 48 to 90 of Macquarie Bank’s 2007 annual review give chapter and verse on who is getting what at the Millionaires Factory.

    And record profits mean record bonuses that will surely finally place a handful of Macquarie Bankers onto the 2007 BRW Rich List when it is released later this month.

    If bankers collecting $20 million a year caused a storm 12 months ago, what will the $33.45 million pay packet of CEO Allan Moss do this year?

    In fact, as the following table shows, the top six Macquarie Bank executives shared a staggering $160.32 million in the 12 months to 31 March, 2007.

    Top Six Pay Packets

    Executive

    Position

    2007 pay

    2006 pay

    Allan Moss

    CEO

    $33.45m

    $21.21m

    Nicholas Moore

    Investment banking boss

    $32.89m

    $20.58m

    Bill Moss

    Property boss

    $30.61m

    $12.40m

    Michael Carapiet

    Infrastructure boss

    $22.92m

    $15.88m

    Andrew Downe

    Treasury boss

    $21.49m

    $14.26m

    David Clarke

    Executive chairman

    $18.96m

    $11.42m

    As usual, the bonuses represent more than 90% of all pay packets as none of these lads are guaranteed more than the $670,811 base pay of Allan Moss.

    Chairman and co-founder David Clarke has gone out with a bang with a final payout of $18.96 million before he becomes Australia’s highest paid non-executive chairman on a base fee of $680,000 a year.

    Clarke offloaded 326,135 shares during the year but retains 651,113 shares worth $58.3 million, albeit with a $30 million loan still owed back to the bank.

    Despite the mind-boggling numbers, don’t be surprised when shareholders give the remuneration report another 90%-plus voted at the AGM because the disclosure is excellent and this group ahs lifted Macquarie Bank shares from $6 to $90 since the 1996 float.

    The bank’s bonus system has a strong long-term focus which locks executives into the future, so it’s no coincidence that the same names have been appearing in Macquarie’s top pay packet lists for the last few years.

    The bank finished the year with just over 10,000 staff who shared an average pay packet of $360,000. Exactly 50% of the bank’s $7.18 billion in income goes to employees and the remuneration report points out this as in line with its competitors and US consultant Towers Perrin has approved it.

    Shareholders have absolutely nothing to complain about, it’s Macquarie customers, clients and counter-parties who should perhaps be scratching their heads about getting out-smarted by what is now arguably the world’s biggest private equity firm.

    Send your tips to boss@crikey.com.au or submit them anonymously here.

    Postscript #1


    At the time of writing yesterday morning we didn't realise (believe it or not) that the front pagers of Sydney Morning Herald here

    The fineprint: a $33m pay cheque Bank boss Allan Moss is worth 669 graduate teachers or 108 prime ministers.  ...but you will pay their tax bill 

    and The Australian

    Treasurer can't share Mac bankers' glee | News | The Australian

    as pictured above 16th May 2007, both went the Big Sledge on sleazy Macquarie Bank with their huge salaries. To see these late last night was very heartening really because truly it is said the root of all evil is the love of money.

    We felt it was a big story courtesy of Stephen Mayne's piece in Crikey.com.au a full 12 hours before the traditional press, and woke up keen to echo his work, having spent the night feeling beaten over the ongoing forest destruction in my state of NSW and East Gippsland  (Gulaga story as above and below), and it seems the Big Media were on their production timeline in parallel with the same concerns.

    Postscript #2

    Peter Hartcher get's it way wrong about Australian values in the Herald today here Peter Hartcher: Macquarie's small bickies compared with big boys. Not only does it prove there is a failure of moral values but by comparing with international rapacious capital of Wall Street all he is doing is explaining the economically cruel and unsustainable global business system that has led to vicious terrorist backlash, ecological collapse, and profound market failure via global warming. That's nothing to be proud of in Macquarie Bank or the western world.

    But it does underline even a talent like Peter Hartcher doesn't get it on why he personally should declare his own excessively generous AWA with Fairfax when commenting on industrial relations, as all other Big Media should to show they are doing the advocacy of big business hierarchy, a tone set by Macqurie bank.


    Posted by editor at 10:23 AM NZT
    Updated: Thursday, 17 May 2007 9:50 AM NZT

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