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sydney alternative media - non-profit community independent trustworthy
Sunday, 10 June 2007
2 voices in Sydney on the miserable conflict in Palestine
Mood:  sad
Topic: peace

#1

The Social Justice Network

Media release

 

9 June 2007

 

40th Anniversary of Israeli occupation of Arab lands:

Israeli occupation of Palestine and other Arab lands should end now

 

Israel had marked this year’s 40th anniversary of its occupation of West Bank, Gaza strip and Golan Heights with more oppression, continued detention without charges of Palestinians and Syrians and more blood shed in West Bank and Gaza strip. All this and the international community is watching carelessly with no action to stop these atrocities.

 

“We are very concerned about the international community’s hypocrisy when it comes to Israel’s treatment” said Jamal Daoud, the spokesperson of the Social Justice Network. “Israel is refusing to implement more than 65 UN resolutions, violating all international treaties about treatment of people under occupation and all relevant international law about military conduct during war time. Yet, the international community did not move to punish or isolate this renegade state”

 

“The heightened hypocrisy of the UN and the international community was in its clearest display last month. The Security Council was quick and within less than one week to meet and adopt resolution 1757 to form Special court to investigate the assassination of Mr Hariry, under article VII”

 

“We understand that there is no wide spread civil unrest, daily massacres, wide spread violation of international laws and treaties in the aftermath of this assassination. Yet the Security Council was quick to adopt such resolution, even without the approval of Lebanese political apparatus”

 

The Palestinians were subjected to ethnic cleansing since 1948, their rights as human being was and is still grossly violated, their elected parliamentarians are illegally detained and their lands are grossly confiscated daily. Israel also occupies lands of other neighboring countries, Syria and Lebanon. Yet, the Security Council failed to adopt resolution under VII article to stop all these violations and atrocities.

 

“All aspects of international dealing with Israel are highly hypocritical. The international community’s dealing with Iran’s nuclear program is another example” said Mr Daoud. “Iran is under immense threats from international security for trying to develop nuclear program for peaceful use”

We, in the network, are not necessarily supporting using nuclear energy as alternative. But at the same time we are observing that the international community is deadly silent on the fact that Israel is stockpiling tones of nuclear, biological and chemical weapons of mass destruction”

 

In this sad commemoration, we stand in solidarity with the Palestinian, Syrian and Lebanese people under Israeli occupation. We condemn the international community silence on Israeli crimes and gross violation to human rights.

 

We also remember the struggle of million Palestinian, Lebanese and Syrian refugees because of Israeli aggression and occupation. The anniversary is coming just weeks before the world’s celebration of World Refugee Day. We note here that the Palestinians are the largest refugee ethnic group.

 

The Network will work very hard to raise the awareness among Australians on this important social justice issue. We note also the deadly silence of most of Australian politicians to demand justice for Israeli aggression’s victims. 

 

The international community should act soon to force Israel to recognize and to implement international treaties and laws.

 

For media interviews, you can call Jamal Daoud on 0413 467 367

........................................................................

#2 From the Australian 9th June 2007 Israeli watchdog finds alarming level of indoctrination in Palestine

 

A GENERATION has passed since the 1967 Six-Day War that created the Palestinian territories as they are today. But the bleak portrait that emerges of Palestinian society through a study of its media and culture reveals the next generation is being radicalised almost from birth.

When Monica Attard and her researchers scan Australia's media for the weekly Media Watch program on ABC television, the focus is on plagiarism, misrepresentation or conflicts of interest. When Itamar Marcus, the director of the Palestinian Media Watch website, views TV broadcasts, he sees children being brainwashed to become suicide bombers. Marcus was in Australia this week to advise federal MPs and security groups.

PMW is an Israeli organisation, established in 1996 to monitor Palestinian Arabic language media and analyse such seemingly innocuous activities as summer camps, poetry, school books, crosswords and religious instruction. But PMW revealed last month that Hamas-owned al-Aqsa TV was broadcasting a children's program featuring a Mickey Mouse clone called Farfur who was preaching Islamic supremacy. After an uproar, Hamas stopped using Farfur for this purpose, but the indoctrination continues and children are a key target.

On May 27, a new music video clip was aired on al-Aqsa urging children to become shaheeds, or martyrs. It shows a pre-pubescent boy holding an AK47 while a chorus sings "machinegun and Koran in our hands". The child becomes a Hamas fighter and dies as the choir sings "the pure blood will produce honour and glory".

The promotion of martyrdom to children has been a recurring message since the second intifada. From 2000 to 2003, Fatah-controlled Palestinian Authority TV broadcast a music video thousands of times depicting Mohammed al-Dura, a Palestinian child killed in crossfire in 2000, in shaheed paradise. The al-Dura figure says: "I am waving to you not in parting but to say, 'Follow me'."

The Palestinian Authority took it off the air after Marcus testified about it to a US Senate committee. "But it was suddenly broadcast again in June 2006 after the kidnapping of Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit," Marcus says. "Israeli troops were preparing to enter Gaza to search for Shalit and the Palestinians wanted children to be on the frontlines.

"They convince the children that it's better to die and then if the children are killed they run to the media saying, 'Protect our children from the Israeli soldiers who are killing them.' In fact, the children need protection from their own leaders."

On March 21 this year, Hamas TV sank to a new low. It broadcast a clip of a four-year-old girl, Duha, whose mother blew herself up in January 2004, killing four Israelis. Duha sings: "Instead of me you carried a bomb in your hands. Only now, I know what was more precious than us. I am following Mummy in her steps", as she picks up a stick of dynamite. On March 8, Hamas TV interviewed Duha, now seven, and asked her where her mother was. She replied, "Paradise", and after prompting recited a poem about her mother that said: "Reem, you are a fire bomb, your children and submachinegun are your motto."

"This is pure child abuse," Marcus says.

For a population of little more than two million people in the territories, Palestinians would seem to have a thriving media with as many as 25 private TV stations. But there is remarkable uniformity. Programming on the two main satellite TV stations, PBC TV, also Fatah-controlled, and Hamas's al-Aqsa TV, which began satellite broadcasts in February, is indistinguishable. Fatah TV is very religious, interrupting programs for prayers five times a day and broadcasting nothing but sermons during Ramadan. There are also three newspapers: one belongs to Hamas, another to Fatah, and one is independent. Yet there is not much diversity of views. What PMW has monitored is a transformation in the Palestinian struggle from a nationalist battle to a religious conflict.

"From 1996 to 2000 we saw a steady incitement to hatred but it wasn't violence," he says. "In July 2000, it shifted to violence for God. It became so intense that on September30 we reported that 'the atmosphere today in Palestinian media is on the eve of the outbreak of war'. A week later, the intifada began."

Palestinian schoolbooks, which have been produced since 2000 by the Fatah-controlled ministry of education, couch the Palestinian struggle in religious terminology. "As long as the conflict was nationalistic, territorial, compromise could be a possibility. Once it's been packaged as a religious conflict for God, it makes it literally impossible to compromise," Marcus says.

Marcus sees this as part of a general process of Islamisation in many Muslim countries. "But Arafat and Fatah used Islamic terminology to give religious backing to their conflict. He did this for his own political gain but he ended up doing PR for Hamas, which now has 56 per cent of the seats," Marcus says.

The trouble is that Hamas objects on religious grounds even to the Jews' right to exist. For example, Hamas spokesman Ismail Radwan cited a hadith (prophet Mohammed's saying) on March 30 on Palestinian Authority TV saying "the hour of the resurrection will not take place until the Muslims fight the Jews and the Muslims kill them, and the rock and the tree will say: 'Oh, Muslim, servant of Allah, there is a Jew behind me, kill him."' Meanwhile, Fatah, which presents a moderate face to the world in English, shows a much more uncompromising one to Palestinian people in Arabic.

Marcus gives an example of Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas saying in English to Condoleezza Rice on October 4, 2006, that "Hamas must recognise Israel". But in an Arabic interview the next day he said the opposite.

He adds: "People assume that there is a real difference between Hamas and Fatah. There is no difference except that Hamas says the same thing in English and Arabic whereas Fatah speaks the language of compromise in English and the language of Hamas in Arabic."

 


Posted by editor at 11:22 PM NZT
Updated: Sunday, 10 June 2007 11:32 PM NZT
John Howard's betrayal of practical reconciliation with broken $40M 1996 election promise for Cape York Land Use Agreement
Mood:  sharp
Topic: indigenous

This article in the Weekend Australian, Noel Pearson

 

The ideal equilibrium | The Australian Your Say Blog

 

should have read - John Howard’s 1996 betrayal of “practical reconciliation” $40M broken election promise for Cape York Land Use Agreement (CYLUA). Because those are the seeds of the desperation that Pearson is complaining about but refuses to acknowledge in his article:

 

Here is the reference for that broken 1996 election promise, compounded again in 1998 with another broken pre election media release promise of Minister Robert Hill

 

$40 Million in Federal Funding for Cape York Plan Media Release 16 ...

 

The money was never paid to jump start employment in the Cape and the CYLUA became a dead letter despite 1996 promises to support it prior to the Howard election ousting Paul Keating. The Wilderness Society corroborates this real history of Noel Pearson's new friends amongst the conservatives:

 

The Wilderness Society - Cape York and Robert Hill's folly

 

Noel Pearson of Cape York Institute for Policy and Leadership

 appears to have become the catspaw of Big Capital through the pages of the anti green, big coal The Australian. Maybe he is getting worried that his compromise with the Howard Govt are about to run out of time come the next federal election.

 

Noel Pearson makes egregious slurs in his column this weekend. A slur that must not go unanswered. Nor should his airbrushing of the Howard Govt’s wicked failures in regards to implementation of the Cape York Land Use Agreement of 1996.

 

First the slur

 

“Few tears are shed when thousands die and billions suffer. It may be the underlying psychology of extreme Western environmentalism is that mass depopulation from disease and starvation would be an ecological benefit.”

 

But who exactly, specifically holds these views in Australia, Mr Pearson? The truth is the sensitivity to the rights of the environment springs from the same respect for all life and Indigenous People and culture.

 

I want to know if Pearson is accusing this writer of such. Specifically. If he is I will be looking at a defamation action.

 

In all of his article this weekend he omits in the most sleazy way the history under Howard that he lauds including achievement via one Greg Sargent of The Wilderness Society who tragically died of skin cancer some years ago, and can't speak for himself.

 

The context of the weasly Pearson article above such as disgusting editorial here and accompanying articles by “environment reporter” Matthew Warren here 

 

Extreme greens prevent growth

 

and here

 

Green means go for show | Science & nature | The Australian

 

tells its all.

 

Warren is the anti climate change green writer from the Coal Lobby that puts mafia in the phrase 'greenhouse mafia'. What will sea rise do to the Cape or the wetlands I wonder? And let's not forget Warren's pro uranium mining position for his paper, after the weapons testing in the jungles up there on the Cape decades ago. Here is the referencing ABC TV Documentaries: Fortress Australia

 

(We are advised that film by Peter Butt refers to a simulated nuclear test in the Iron Range National Park around 1972, and the local police sergeant died of a mysterious illness 10 months later.)

 

So we feel Pearson is indeed being positioned as the catspaw of big capital against independent and committed green movement which includes the The Wilderness Society, not beholden to any political party, unlike WWF to the Coalition, or ACF to the Labor Party, both big business in alliance setting.

 

It is all so pathetically transparent and immoral as the smear by Waren of Kevin Rudd’s Prius presumably chosen not only for greenhouse claims, but also for it's low particulate pollution impact, in urban areas at least as important an environmental agenda, and probably recyclables. These latter criteria are totally airbrushed in that article same edition of the paper. Typical. Toyota no doubt make other claims about their environmental performance that can be debated but at least they are pitching.

 

Why no mention of the Howard betrayal of “practical reconciliation” with the broken election promise of $40M to implement a pro cattle and agri industry model in that CYLUA? There was plenty of industry agenda within that CYLUA under Farley, Sergeant and Jacko.

 

That’s Pearson’s political bias and pandering to the current Howard govt, as charged by Mick Dodson in the Fairfax Press 2 weeks ago: Favoured leaders slated as government 'pets' - National - smh.com.au

 

I personally find the slur above an outrageous smear, and a disgusting wild exageration. Only weeks ago I was doing legal checking to reinforce Sam Watson’s interview on the Palm Island Death in Custody scandal for broadcast here on Ch31 Sydney, the same Sam Watson who features on the same page as Warren’s sleaze piece: 

 

Symbol clash at Palm cop's trial | The Nation | The Australian

 

In 1989 I completed my honours thesis: A legal foundation for Aboriginal Land Rights at ANU Law School virtually predicting the Mabo no.2 High Court decision in favour of native title rights, that launched Noel Pearson’s public profile. And I've kept faith with that 15 years since.

 

So the evil ultra violence inflicted on the Aboriginal people, which has precious little to do with the environment movement and who have been horrified by these historic wrongs, have taken their course with Pearson seeking revenge against the white people who love(d) him and love the Aboriginal culture possibly the most from our side of a wide gulf.

 

Isn’t it always the way, that you hurt the people who love you most simply because they are closest on the political spectrum. That’s another form of victim mentality, and shame. Stop taking your pain out on the greens Noel. It's not right. And it's not fair.

...............................................

 

Postscript #1 Monday 11th June 2007

 

What appears to be happening with Noel Pearson from the recent  Australian Story Cry Me a River is that he is getting fat and middle aged, tired and jaundiced. He says as much that he 'is sick of this struggle' and wants a normal life. But the hard, profound truth from one who knows, is in a vocation regarding huge historical issues like social and land justice for Indigenous the world over, and environmental destruction by Big Capital the struggle is NEVER over.

 

It's not a timeline based on one person's life cycle or what life stage they have arrived at.

 

Later on yesterday after our angry repudiation of Pearson's generic smear we read this below at the heart of Pearson's media and industry allies at The Australian same edition page 40 9-10 June 2007 - shale oil extremism, as an indicator how these guys just don't get climate change imperatives AT ALL let alone sustainable development:

 

With oil on the skids, US hails shale  


The diagram shows to quote

 

"In the high desert near Rifle, Colorado, rods 600m underground to heat the shale to 370 degrees Celsius, the tempereature at which Teflon melts. The heat will be applied for the next four years to convert the hydrocarbons ....into high quality crude ....

 

"The old technique required them to dig the equivalent of the Panama Canal every month", said former Colorado governor Richard Lamm, whose tenure from 1975 to 1987 included the last attempt to extract oil from shale. "This new approach is a much more sane process, but that's all relative," Lamm says. "They're doing this in an immensely fragile area where wagon ruts from the Oregon Trail in the 1840's are still visible. It doesn't excite me because I think they're about to indelibly change our state."

 

 

 

And this shale is not some boutique aspiration, as the lead in says:

 

"Colorado and Utah have as much oil as Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Venezeula, Nigeria, Kuwait, Libya, Angola, Algeria, Indonesia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates combined." 

 

and later

 

"If we waited a few million years, all this stuff would turn to oil" Rand's Bartis says. "Some people don't want to wait that long."

 

You can't get a better warning about extreme capitalism to the custodians of a 40,000 year old Aboriginal culture than that on Cape York. And there is shale oil in Qld too The Stuart shale oil project: will it be Beattie's Ningaloo or his ... , but if not shale oil someother extreme developer agenda. And if Pearson thinks he can ride that kind of bucking monster into a tame pony he is living an illusion. Big Capital is not like that and not interested a jot in respecting the human and environmental values of the Cape. It's all about big money and power. And vulnerability of middle aged men.

 

Postscript #2

Part A 

The Australian declined to publish my submission last night on their comments page to the story above:

This is what we wrote this morning, as well as copying the above to the Pearson's Cape York Insitute by email, and notice the challenge to the Murdoch press to publish this below or be exposed for censorship:

at 10.35 am 11th June 2005

http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/yoursay/index.php/theaustralian/comments/the_ideal_equilibrium/P20/

It was John Howard and his minister Robert Hill who refused to support the pro economic development Cape York Land Use Agreement with greens and pastoralists as promised at both the 1996 and 1998 election.

Howard's regime destroyed that living treaty causing Pearson's cries of desperation now. And now he seems to be doing Howard's work as a wedge and a catspaw, as pointed out by Mick Dodson in the Fairfax press, as described on my blog.

Prove it isn't so, if you can, Noel Pearson in the lead up to this federal election. I am copying this to my blog to see if The Australian has the guts to publish it.

Unlike the censoring of my submission of last night ... tsk tsk, democracy of the blog, but only as far as you can control it?

www.sydneyalternativemedia.com

..................

Part B

Sent: Monday, June 11, 2007 9:34 AM
Subject: response to your director in The Australian, Australian Story, etc etc 
 
Dear CYI/Noel Pearson
 
It seems to me your director has been courting a serious response from the greenies down south, right down south here as far as Sydney, though I come from even further south on Bass Strait, Warrnambool originally, which means meeting of two rivers.
So here it is and its not that pretty. I met Gumbra Jacko, Peter Costello and Greg Sergeant and Rick Farley over the years and including 1994 Starke campaign here in Sydney the land of cancer causing Smog.
 
But even so I think your director is using unworthy wild exageration, and kidding himself he can ride a bucking monster like Big Capital into a docile pony as regards the best interests of the Cape and its people. That's my advice and my challenge person to person, white greenie to Black traditional owners.
 
A first version of this repudiation of the philosophical smear has been copied to federal MPs. Since then I've realised the Shale Oil indicator of the Big Capital madness via The Australian, and the nuke test in Iron Range National Park (which is quite significant given the nuke weapons deterrent on Australian soil agenda of this Howard Govt are moving toward, vis a vis USA Missile Defence relations with China, North Korea Japan Taiwan South Korea, Singapore and others etc).
 
Bucking monster indeed.
 
Respectfully yours,
Tom McLoughlin, principal ecology action australian http://cpppcltrust.com/ecologyactionsydney
editor www.sydneyalternativemedia.com
editor background
tel 0410 558838
 
Postscript #3
[Joint press release of 2003 by ACF and TWS, from our archive received by email June 4 2003 from The Wilderness Society]
MEDIA RELEASE

Senate Inquiry called for as $40 million Cape York Natural Heritage Trust Plan Flounders

Conservation groups have today called for a Senate Inquiry into the failure of the Federal Government to deliver on the Prime Ministers pre-election promise to protect Cape York Peninsula.

To support their call, conservation groups released a review of the $40 million Cape York Natural Heritage Trust Plan, which shows that of $12 million promised for expanding and enhancing protected areas, only 1 % has been allocated.

"In 1996, the Prime Minister promised to ensure that Cape York Peninsula's 'high conservation areas are fully protected'. Yet seven years later, only $140 000 of the committed $12 million has been spent on this," said Australian Conservation Foundation Executive Director, Don Henry.

"Given the outstanding conservation values of Cape York Peninsula, it is deeply concerning that so little Commonwealth funding has been put into promises to protect high value conservation areas."

"A Senate Inquiry should ask what has happened to the Prime Minister's promise and where's the money?" said Mr Henry.

The Wilderness Society's National Campaign Director, Alec Marr said, "The review does show that $7 million of a promised $8 million has been spent on indigenous people's land management, which we strongly support."

Mr. Marr said "The groups are calling for a reformed Cape York Natural Heritage Trust Plan, focussing on:
- A strong voluntary property acquisition strategy for areas of high conservation value;
- Substantially increased funds for National Park and protected areas management;
- Recurrent funding for Indigenous Land and Sea Management Centres and other Indigenous conservation initiatives; and
- A Peninsula-wide conservation plan, including a weeds and feral animal strategy;
- Support for the development of ecologically sustainable industries."

"The recent Commonwealth Biodiversity Assessment highlighted the Cape as a critical sanctuary for Australian mammals and birds and the importance of conservation action. Yet the Prime Minister's $12 million promise is missing in inaction", concluded Mr Marr.

To view a full copy of the submission, visit 
www.wilderness.org.au/capeyorknhtreview.pdf


For further information contact:
Don Henry, Executive Director Australian Conservation Foundation: 0418 501 395
Alec Marr, National Campaign Director, the Wilderness Society: 0417 229670
........................
 
Postscript #3
More evidence of where this Howard Govt are coming from here?
Did Australia demand reversal on natives? Ottawa pulled support after Howard's visit

Posted by editor at 9:32 PM NZT
Updated: Saturday, 16 June 2007 10:25 AM NZT
Sunday political talkies - Is God angy, she seems to be
Mood:  caffeinated
Topic: indigenous

 

Author’s general introductory note (skip this if you know this regular weekly column):

 

This is not a well packaged story. It’s a contemporaneous traverse of the Sunday television free to air political talkies indicating the agenda of Establishment interests: Better to know ones rivals and allies  in Big Politics and Big Media.

 

Indeed it’s the tv version monitoring task similar to what Nelson Mandela refers to here in his book Long Walk to Freedom (1994, Abacus) written in Robben Island prison (where he was meant to die like other African resister chiefs of history in the 19C), at page 208

 

“..newspapers are only a shadow of reality; their information is important to a freedom fighter not because it reveals the truth, but because it discloses the biases and perceptions of both those who produce the paper and those who read it.”

 

Just substitute ‘Sunday tv political talkie shows’ for "newspapers" in the quote above.

 

 

For actual transcripts go to web sites quoted below except with Riley Diary on 7. And note transcripts don’t really give you the image content value.

 

 

Media backgrounder:

Picture: Tim Blair right wing blogger has realised like Wendy Deng wife of Rupert Murdoch, that Kevin Rudd's language skills are a profound change for the better when we have many big issues with China on climate change and security this next decade. Inset is the wonderful David Rowe in today's Sydney SunHerald echo of this below - great outdoor chess set at local community centre.

 

chesslaunch5
 -         state ALP battle cardinal Pell bringing ALP female politicians to the fore

- good economic figures airbrush under employment figures but never mentioned

-         Keating riposte to Costello alleged economic mastery on Lateline

-         G8 on climate change preface to APEC in Sept 07

-         But the trump of all was the ferocious and fatal weather storms in NSW with ship stranded, family killed outright in shocker road collapse, following rail shock crash harbinger start of the week. Is God angry – maybe she is.

 

10 Meet the Press 8-8.30 am

 

Kevin Rudd front, sounding  a little head cold fluey but clear and moderated.

 

Petrol monitoring.

 

Kyoto attack by PM footage. China and India massive increase coal generated ghg.

 

Rudd attacks ‘Pledge and Review’ back to late 90ies. Sounds strong. Carbon target, carbon trading. Canada 20% by 2020. Q. Nuclear as there? KR dodges saying market is the answer.

 

Never ever silly on nuclear. Leave to market. Sounding strong on clean renewables. Rich array achieve without taking on extra safety and environmental problems.

 

Joe Hockey as shrek with nice Scottish accent. Keating watched it shows he’s got too much time on his hands?

 

Panel quality of 2, Michelle Grattan Age Melbourne, Clinton Porteus Courier Mail Murdoch Brisbane, this is the Keating fall out section …

 

MG kicks off …even Keating says …..

 

Even under Keating …. In 90ies 3.2% productivity growth – straight out paraphrase of Keating on Lateline. All these road tested lines coming out re world boom IMF, World Bank.

 

Union threats – KR refers to Hawke Accord examples of 80ies. Fundamental economic reforms. Proud labour history – again responding to PK concerns.

 

Union knocked off Linda Kirk endorsed by Shoppies official asks MG.

 

CP – unemployment – ignores question goes to productivity, great silent story. PB brings him back – goes to training.

 

Max Gillies – via Get Up “claims to be independent” runs YouTube piece link

 

Footage of Howard change for the better mantra – time for change idea faltering?                     

 

No restore the balance, work family balance, housing affordability, Iraq, climate, education, new technology.

 

CP doing the Murdoch press job, Qld full page adverts in central QLD take on Beatie. Disagrees on local govt amalgamations. Voluntary.

 

MG – donate a home for the PM, by the business community in Melbourne. KR - Shouldn’t use Lodge or Kirribili for fundraising.

 

MG – Shergold playing political role, public service heads. Restore westminister. Times up.

 

 

 

 

Transcript in due course www.ten.com.au/meetthepress

 

 

 

7 Weekend Sunrise, 8.35-40 am Riley Diary  -

 

Congratulations 7 for streaming this on your website (2 week delay?)

 

 

Very interesting and amusing again. Satire of PM but equally cutting of Rudd stuff up IF he were PM.

 

Mostly entertaining. Female compare in her stride too. Andrew is still the most natural with his chisel/dentist comment.

 

2 and 9 to follow

 

 

Sunday 9

Follow of drug story last week, Abbott embarrassed, but shows limited resourcing at 9 now for Sunday.  Move on to brain injury wonder drug, positive to balance negative.

 

Ray Martin with Dalai Llama – great work by Sunday, giving a proper respect to a religious leader of 100’s of millions. Standing against Chinese dictators censorship. Australian political 'leaders' won't meet him. What a disgrace. 

Missile Defence story is very good summary (again, by Tim Lester), Beazley conspicuous, Asia reaction very worried. The same old thesis we have been plugging away at for 12 months now on SAM and before that on IMC re Taiwan, North Korea, Japan, Australia promoting an arms race and nuke weapons deterrent on our soil. In short an arms race.

 

 

http://sunday.ninemsn.com.au/sunday/default.asp

Insiders 2

Conroy on IT future, praises Hawke Keating achievements.

 

Everyperson segment – missed it.

 

Panel – Middleton SBS, Marr SMH, Ackerman Murdoch Sydney tabloid Sydney Telegraph.

 

Paul Kelly Murdoch broadsheet – on economic figures -

 

Panel talk on Keating stuff.

 

G8 climate change, Pell in NSW, Milne cracker story hurting PM Howard

 

Talking pics with Peter Andren MHR independent.

 

Akerman foreshadows more stories of nasty union behaviour this week.

 

Home page is http://www.abc.net.au/insiders/


Posted by editor at 10:59 AM NZT
Updated: Friday, 18 January 2008 11:11 AM EADT
P plate driver gets a bad tree change, Illawarra Rd Marrickville
Mood:  accident prone
Topic: local news


 

Picture: car crush. Bottom right images shows view into back seat via rear passenger window, internal roof light is jammed on with reflections of camera, building opposite, back of front seat at right.

Posted by editor at 12:14 AM NZT
Saturday, 9 June 2007
What moral weight Paul Keating? Pictures tell half the story, audio the other half - big selfish brain
Mood:  accident prone
Topic: election Oz 2007

We took these pictures off Lateline webcast Friday night show just now, following the Thursday night big blast (also below). And see commentary below. If PK is not "ginned up" in some sections, to borrow Barak Obama's phrase then it's a good impression all the same.

Of particular interest is the picture of Keating hobnobbing with one of the other 4 amigoes of the Old Sussex St NSW ALP Right Laurie Brereton involved in recent years in smashing the NSW Planning legislative framework in order to expand Port Botany against the Inquiry of Commissioner Kevin Cleland, via a qango called the Freight Infrastructure Advisory Board. Is Keating on the payroll? We would love to know. The event is the May 2006 launch of the book The longest decade, by moderate political economic writer George Meglogenis of The Australian Murdoch press and often on Insiders.

Another jarring moment was the audio of the "incompetent unions" compared to the saintly pose of Greg Combet who helped centrally to deliver a $4B asbestos compensation fund to victims across all strata of society. Shamefully cavalier language from Keating really.

We haven't pictured Julia Gillard shadow minister below, because we feel she is well out of this somehow particularly male egomaniacal context. What we also liked was the humour in Rudd's reaction, shown below leaning forward on his toes, as if to emphasise a charitable response, for a charity case. Mmm. Quite appealing and impressive actually.

 Pictures, from top: face pulling by Keating, Greg Combet unionist, Keating looks away constructing a line about Julia Gillard in his mind that fits the exagerated thesis, Rudd's charitable reaction, Beazley Gray and Epstein 1998, Keating with ex federal minister Brereton 2006.

 

More commentary

We've been mulling over Paul Keating's psychology these last 24 hours. The political consequence of going the bash on his own team is obvious - humour for the enemies of the ALP, and gnawing self doubt for the ALP Family when confidence and morale is a premium.

So the question becomes twofold 1. why did PK do it? and 2. is it true?

The answers to both we suspect, confusingly are related. We keep having images of Glen Milne going the swing at Crikey staff. Glen was so embarrassed professionally he quit drinking so it seems. Milne's work has revived in quality and quantity in the press. Well done.

Then there is our own experience: Alcoholic father and grandfather. We went tea total 12 months back, and feel great for it too. Just stay away from my coffee. My work has revived similarly along with my mood.

Then there is Bill Leak accused by his ex girlfriend of being "a cruel bastard". Bill is on the wagon too, hearing tunes in his head and drawing inspired cartoons about Kevin Ruddy/Tintin and double backflips with bellyflop. That's revival. Beautiful stuff.

Paul Keating after a life long of fine reds? The odd Glenfiddich double malt, 21 years? We wonder. We know how these secrets run their course.

Because this is where the truth question kicks in. Or rather, how true is more like it? Gary Grey ex federal ALP ex Woodside now candidate, David Epstein et al are "no value" people says Keating?  

Paul Keating on the lead-up to the federal election

07/06/2007 The former Prime Minister, Paul Keating, speaks with Tony Jones about the political climate in the lead-up to the federal election.

We in the law know a categorical exageration when we see it and how evidence in such terms is bound to be misconceived. Never ever, 100%, Black and White, Pure Certainty. These absolutes are not the real world. When a witness goes that way you can tell they are leaning into the answer.

So it's safe to say these senior ALP folks do really "have value". It's probably safe to say they are not quite A1 quality as per the Keating sledges, as Rudd would say and hope, this side of a near election contest. But similarly that they have the potential, as likely we all do.

But it's even more likely, Keating is a genius gone sour, compares his huge talent (or perhaps more accurately the memory of such talent) with lesser mortals, and wounds them cruelly projecting his own ugliness (read drink?) rather than lift them up or take them with him. After all Paul, politics is essentially about popularity no matter how right or good, a cruel and unfair master at the best of times.

Mandela says - 'a leader lets the most nimble go forward and find the path' and 'a leader's duty is to keep the group together, those in front and those straggling behind'.

These comments say so very much. That a good leader humbly acknowledges the skill and wit of his 'followers' even beyond his own, is not threatened by their abilities, and understands the deep truth that we are all limited human beings and no one can be it, and do it, all.

It also says - not all can be as gifted or "keep up" with the genius or ability of the leader or his closest helpers. Yet a real leader works at, and keeps an eye to the whole group's cohesion and well being, even the slow ones. And why do that if you are concerned with victory first and foremost? Why not just cut 'em loose as PK implies?

Because everyone at some time in their life is bound to be straggling, when before they were leading. First and last depending on the snapshot. Even Paul Keating. That's life. We all intuitively know it. So if you are a compassionate leader who cares for the stragglers even the fast ones feel better and safer for it, and love you for that too, and work above and beyond the call of duty. Love, Paul, not obedience per se. They reach for their A1 quality and even achieve it. Becasue we all know one day that could be, will be, me if bad luck strikes.

But it's not all bad luck. In many ways where you finish up at the end of life's journey, leading, stone mother last, or in the middle is a personal choice: Such as faith in the great deceiver, alcohol, or not. This nasty drug takes you up but always leaves you further down than when you started until you end up gasping for credibility in the dangerous white water rapids of a Tony Jones Lateline hazard.

We will now go and see if Rudd has been swallowed by the same rapids, as those poor victims of the floodwaters yesterday, and Paul Keating the day before has already been (even if he thinks not):

Rudd defends party against Keating attack

08/06/2007 Labor Leader Kevin Rudd has defended his party against suggestions from former prime minister Paul Keating that its members are not capable of winning the election.

It's almost as if Keating is being "defeatist" to quote Gillard, that if he lost against Howard in 1996 everyone else must too or be seen as better than the great PK. But who is to say they are not greater? We will see in due course. Because no one knows. Not John Howard, not Paul Keating, Kevin Rudd, Grey, Epstein, the gaggle of commentators and definitely not this writer.

Postscript #2 - late Saturday 9th June

Well live and learn. We went back to the main interview of last Thursday night, all 25 minutes of it

Paul Keating on the lead-up to the federal election

07/06/2007 The former Prime Minister, Paul Keating, speaks with Tony Jones about the political climate in the lead-up to the federal election.

 after reading Matt Price in The Oz Murdoch press today:

Matt Price: Paul just getting better all the time

because he said staffers in parliament (party non specific) were playing and replaying the interview, which pricked our interest, and to give PK a fair hearing, not second hand from big media hacks generally.

And a re- appraisal is in order. We don't fully retract the tone of our sledge about a punchy ginned up personal aggression of Big Paul Keating. But we do say this:

For the first 10 minutes of a long long interview it is a bravura performance explaining even to an economics amateur like me where the political economy of the country has been. Especially the Hawke Keating govt role. A role the party of the bosses would be proud of in terms of productivity, killing the inflation dragon, enterprise bargaining replacing centralised wage fixing/pattern bargaining, raising wages 2 per cent per year over 20 years but also critically floating the dollar and absorbing both Asian economic shocks and booming mineral exports now.

And the rest of the interview full 25 minutes interview, on national tv no less, one to one talkies is mostly high level analysis too. It pays to replay in parts because like the West Wing the content is dense. But though I am no economics trained observer I notice a major flaw apart from the psychological violence on his rivals within the modern ALP, as above:

PK notes Howard had interest rates running at 21% in 1982 - and lost the 1983 election. Keating had interests rates 16% or so 1995-6 - and lost that election. But PK actually has the gall to say interest rates were not an issue in 1996. Wrong. Very wrong. For whatever reason they were, unlike the 1993 election though rates were of similar magnitude. Maybe because people's exposure was just so much greater on higher capital investments/mortgages etc (a bit like a climber 100 feet off ground same objective difficulty as 3 feet off the ground, but much much scarier)?

But apart from this, some criticism above - and lastly PK's inconsistency of junking "comparative wage justice" [ie pattern bargaining across sectors] "which had to go" yet defending the right of collective unionism, which surely is the localised version of the same thing - there is a hell of a lot to recommend Keating's 25 minute lecture. It pricks the puffery of Costello's alleged economic mastery. Rather implies Christian Kerr's sledge of laziness.

Subject to the GST being alot bigger deal than Keating is willing to acknowledge - bailed out the social services budget which was bleeding as per the Democrat thesis.

In that sense it becomes clear why Rudd was looking so happy with the whole thing. It will shock the govt as much as bruise the ALP egos.  Younger egos that will mature and grow from the lecture, which could have been given without the intergenerational spite and acid we have come to expect from the inflated boomers PK included.

We have never forgetten PK's disdain for the environment, not least the loggers who thrashed him in 1994, dudding Faulkner in the process, and we noticed a PK rare past confession as to this very profound failing.

In conclusion not so much a "sad" or "charity" case, as one to be analysed carefully. Just as his preselection was built on sharp tactics a good 30 years ago, and now is laced with selectivity and exageration. Common trait of geniuses actually.


Posted by editor at 12:09 PM NZT
Updated: Sunday, 10 June 2007 10:52 AM NZT
Time to replace the teapot in the age of climate change? (Twitter warning)
Mood:  quizzical
Topic: globalWarming

It's an inside day. It's wet in Sydney. There is disaster afoot and best to cocoon, right?

But this chilly greasy cold, of closed windows and high humidity has caused (?!) the smashed teapot above. One thing about being teatotal, you take your tea very seriously. A very small disaster in the scheme of things but then again I want my hot invigorating ginger laced tea damn it.

Another receptacle to brew my lean chai. What? A glass jar? A tin pot? Nah, the thermos of course. So cheap at KMart. Then I get to thinking. Why not always use it instead anyway?

How much energy would be saved using a thermos like they do in cold poorer countries like Chile? Typically in meeting rooms there it is, the vaccuum flask along with the table, chairs, no central heating and extra layer of clothes.

Save energy? Well we remember Richard Glover on 702 radio making a blow for domestic energy bills everywhere by not heating the pot under the running hot water. Why not not heat the pot at all? (Well done on the deletion of shampoo there too Richard, I'm a convert.)

First you don't have to keep the pot warm on the stove on super low heat. You don't need to reboil and top up the pot, or worse chuck out and remake. The ginger prevents stewing (really, try it). This may bear alot more life cycle analysis - like how much energy to make the thermos versus a crokery fired teapot? Still you don't even need a tea cosy. All courtesy of the insulation benefit of a vaccuum. And notice the new design of thermos have a neat release valve without unscrewing for those frail hands.

Mmm, a silver lining to a broken teapot, maybe.

Picture: Muesli pancake: Mix wholemeal flour, one egg, shape milk, cheapest muesli homebrand. Don't let it stand long. Cook on medium heat pan, lid off, on a little oil. Flip once. Eat and listen to Liz Farrelly on radio, doesn't get better than this.


Posted by editor at 10:35 AM NZT
Updated: Saturday, 9 June 2007 11:19 AM NZT
US Intel warned Australia of Bashir group's plan to bomb 'sin spots' 2 weeks before Bali 2002?
Mood:  irritated
Topic: legal


 


Posted by editor at 8:41 AM NZT
Updated: Saturday, 9 June 2007 8:49 AM NZT
Friday, 8 June 2007
Paul Keating ex PM urged to attend NAIDOC activities at local Addison Rd Centre week starting July 8th (and quit the booze?)
Mood:  happy
Topic: local news

 Linda Burney MP launches NAIDOC week action at Addison Gallery 2pm Sunday 8th July 07

In sympathy with the lead article running in the crikey.com.au ezine today here we suggest Paul Keating does indeed get busy again with Indigenous empowerment projects:

Get a job! Therapy for Paul Keating

At Crikey, we love Paul Keating. We love him for floating the dollar. We love the way he and Hawke and Walshie bashed the economy into something fit for the twenty first century. But we worry about old Paul. Hanging out with Jack Lang was pretty cool. Tuning into Jack Lang isn’t.

Postscript #1

We've been mulling over Paul Keating's psychology these last 24 hours. The political consequence of going the bash on his own team is obvious - humour for the enemies of the ALP, and gnawing self doubt for the ALP Family when confidence and morale is a premium.

So the question becomes twofold 1. why did PK do it? and 2. is it true?

The answers to both we suspect, confusingly are related. We keep having images of Glen Milne going the swing at Crikey staff. Glen was so embarrassed professionally he quit drinking so it seems. Milne's work has revived in quality and quantity in the press. Well done.

Then there is our own experience: Alcoholic father and grandfather. We went tea total 12 months back, and feel great for it too. Just stay away from my coffee. My work has revived similarly along with my mood.

Then there is Bill Leak accused by his ex girlfriend of being "a cruel bastard". Bill is on the wagon too, hearing tunes in his head and drawing inspired cartoons about Kevin Ruddy/Tintin and double backflips with bellyflop. That's revival. Beautiful stuff.

Paul Keating after a life long of fine reds? The odd Glenfiddich double malt, 21 years? We wonder. We know how these secrets run their course.

Because this is where the truth question kicks in. Or rather, how true is more like it? Gary Grey ex federal ALP ex Woodside now candidate, David Epstein et al are "no value" people says Keating?  

Paul Keating on the lead-up to the federal election

07/06/2007 The former Prime Minister, Paul Keating, speaks with Tony Jones about the political climate in the lead-up to the federal election.

We in the law know a categorical exageration when we see it and how evidence in such terms is bound to be misconceived. Never ever, 100%, Black and White, Pure Certainty. These absolutes are not the real world. When a witness goes that way you can tell they are leaning into the answer.

So it's safe to say these senior ALP folks do really "have value". It's probably safe to say they are not quite A1 quality as per the Keating sledges, as Rudd would say and hope, this side of a near election contest. But similarly that they have the potential, as likely we all do.

But it's even more likely, Keating is a genius gone sour, compares his huge talent (or perhaps more accurately the memory of such talent) with lesser mortals, and wounds them cruelly projecting his own ugliness (read drink?) rather than lift them up or take them with him. After all Paul, politics is essentially about popularity no matter how right or good, a cruel and unfair master at the best of times.

Mandela says - 'a leader lets the most nimble go forward and find the path' and 'a leader's duty is to keep the group together, those in front and those straggling behind'.

These comments say so very much. That a good leader humbly acknowledges the skill and wit of his 'followers' even beyond his own, is not threatened by their abilities, and understands the deep truth that we are all limited human beings and no one can be it, and do it, all.

It also says - not all can be as gifted or "keep up" with the genius or ability of the leader or his closest helpers. Yet a real leader works at, and keeps an eye to the whole group's cohesion and well being, even the slow ones. And why do that if you are concerned with victory first and foremost? Why not just cut 'em loose as PK implies?

Because everyone at some time in their life is bound to be straggling, when before they were leading. First and last depending on the snapshot. Even Paul Keating. That's life. We all intuitively know it. So if you are a compassionate leader who cares for the stragglers even the fast ones feel better and safer for it, and love you for that too, and work above and beyond the call of duty. Love, Paul, not obedience per se. They reach for their A1 quality and even achieve it. Becasue we all know one day that could be, will be, me if bad luck strikes.

But it's not all bad luck. In many ways where you finish up at the end of life's journey, leading, stone mother last, or in the middle is a personal choice: Such as faith in the great deceiver, alcohol, or not. This nasty drug takes you up but always leaves you further down than when you started until you end up gasping for credibility in the dangerous white water rapids of a Tony Jones Lateline hazard.

We will now go and see if Rudd has been swallowed by the same rapids, as those poor victims of the floodwaters yesterday, and Paul Keating the day before has already been (even if he thinks not):

Rudd defends party against Keating attack

08/06/2007 Labor Leader Kevin Rudd has defended his party against suggestions from former prime minister Paul Keating that its members are not capable of winning the election.

It's almost as if Keating is being "defeatist" to quote Gillard, that if he lost against Howard in 1996 everyone else must too or be seen as better than the great PK. But who is to say they are not greater? We will see in due course. Because no one knows. Not John Howard, not Paul Keating, Kevin Rudd, Grey, Epstein, the gaggle of commentators and definitely not this writer.


Posted by editor at 4:46 PM NZT
Updated: Saturday, 9 June 2007 9:44 AM NZT
Thursday, 7 June 2007
Advertise with Sydney Alternative Media, boost your profile and help sustain community media!
Mood:  a-ok
Topic: advertise?

 

Call us for professional service on tel. 0410 558838 or land line Sydney (02) 9558 9551or send an email Attn Tom to

The editor gets by on about $10K annual income just below the taxable income threshhold. This is for several reasons:

- to keep a low carbon footprint;

- remain independent of vested financial interests, either corporate or party political;

- to show solidarity with the majority of the poor in this world;

- when we do have spare cash we donate it to such as Clean up Columbia here and ecology action Australia projects generally.

- we don't know how to make any more money and still have time for our community media work, and stay independent. Cheesy but realistic.


Posted by editor at 8:10 PM NZT
Updated: Saturday, 22 November 2008 8:39 AM EADT
Cr Khan bowls up green politics to Albanese on the home turf
Mood:  chatty
Topic: election Oz 2007

 

 

With federal govt money involved in this hyper consumption view of the future Cr Khan has plenty to work on in this side of Sydney.  


and here

Media Release - 7 June 2007

Anvil Hill coal mine approved: Govt's climate change credentials in tatters

Greens MP and mining spokesperson Lee Rhiannon said Planning Minister Frank Sartor's decision today to approve the massive Anvil Hill coal mine in the Upper Hunter Valley shows the Iemma government is not serious about addressing climate change or safeguarding the Hunter's water resources.

"This decision shows the Iemma government is completely captured by the coal industry," Ms Rhiannon said.

"The approval sets NSW down the path of no-return. Our state's future has been hijacked by today's announcement.

"While approval has been granted, the fight to stop this and other mines has just begun.

"Greens MPs will join with effected communities in taking peaceful, direct action to resist the expansion of the coal industry.

"The approval of the Anvil Hill mine signals that the 22 applications on the table to build new mines or extend existing mines will also be granted.

"Anvil Hill will produce 10.5 millions tonnes of coal annually. When burnt this coal will produce 27 million tonnes of Co2 annually, equivalent to doubling the number of cars on NSW roads.  It will cause up to $58 billion worth of climate change damage in less than one generation.

"Coal is the elephant in the room when it comes to climate change. 

"Nothing can compensate for the environmental damage this mine will do. Minister Sartor is wrong to think strict conditions or minimal job creation opportunities will be a sufficient trade-off.

"The burning and mining of coal is responsible for 40 percent of Australia's greenhouse gas emissions. Emissions from our coal exports are equivalent to all our domestic greenhouse gas emissions.

"Minister Sartor is swimming against the tide of international scientific evidence on climate change and the need to take urgent action to cut emissions.

"Morris Iemma's children and all of our children will condemn the government for this decision in years to come," Ms Rhiannon said.

Contact: Lee Rhiannon 9230 3551, 0427 861 568
 

............

and here

Vote Climate Goes Live

Australia's first dedicated election website focused on the issue of Climate Change, now moving towards its second year, has just released its "At A Glance" policy analysis.

The "At A Glance" page summarises the different parties' climate related policies in clear and concise graphical tabular format.

The "At A Glance" page will be updated in a week to include links to our policy summary pages and further links to the source material on which the summaries are based.


Help Vote Climate

We are asking your group to become involved in the Vote Climate campaign in a number of ways.
  1. Link to VoteClimate.org.au from your own web page.
  2. Promote VoteClimate.org.au to your lists and friends.
  3. Print out the Vote Climate posters and put them up in your local area, workplace, uni etc.
  4. Carry a Vote Climate banner at this years Walk Against Warming being held the Sunday two weeks before the day of the Federal Election.

When linking to our site please also link to the Big Switch Campaign (no website yet) organised by Greenpeace and the state Conservation Councils.



What is Vote Climate trying to achieve at Federal Election?

Vote Climate is working to the following goals for this election:
  1. get Labor elected
  2. move the control of the senate to the minor parties (most likely Greens)
  3. get a clear strong vote for the climate
  4. push inner city green marginals closer to the point where Greens can win
  5. move all parties to stronger climate policies


What are some other activities your group can undertake?
  1. Run a climate change candidates forum in your local area
  2. If in a Labor / Liberal marginal or Greens/ Labor marginal you could leaflet your electorate with a strong statement on each parties performance on climate change. Vote Climate would be happy to help you draft your letter.
  3. If not in a marginal seat help a group that is in one.
  4. Any number of other activities from stalls, to postering, to talks.


Vote Climate a Unique Website

Vote Climate is entirely self funded by its volunteer campaign team and consequently its voice is not restrained by fear of losing tax deductible status or government funding, unlike the mainstream environment movement. Vote Climate will be the only independent national climate election website to recommend who to vote for and in what order .


A few points on political campaigning?

With the election now under way its time to start applying pressure on the political parties to get outcomes. Here are a few points to guide you along.


Have Labor already won?
  • NO absolutely not.
  • With Rudd in the leadership position they merely have a chance.
  • People interested in a change of government will need to work very hard to make sure this happens.


Applying Pressure
  • Political parties and politicians only care about getting votes in seats they want to win. If you can't give or take away votes in seats they are concerned about you have NOTHING, and that is NOTHING to negotiate with.
  • They will often engage with lobbying in an effort to convince you that you are on the right track and they will do something for you and that you are about to succeed, while all the time simply trying to prevent your group actually doing something that will effect their votes.

  • Parties will make decisions almost always on a least cost analysis (though they usually claim otherwise), comparing the dollar cost of implementing a given policy to the cost/benefit in votes/influence you are offering, the votes they loose and the implication for other key supporters/donors/pressure groups.
  • They will even try and get you working for them, ie THEM "we can't do X unless you give us Y" If you find yourself in this position something has gone wrong with your campaign. Instead the conversations should go YOU "Give us X or we will do Y". Even better is to be able to say YOU "Give us X and we will stop doing Y"
  • If you have limited resources (ie time) avoid talking to people who can not actually influence decisions within their party.


Where to target
  • Liberal will be concerned about seats it might lose to Labor
  • Labor will be concerned about seats it wants to win from the Liberals and seats it might one day lose to the Greens.
  • Greens can use help anywhere to hopefully win Senate seats or in the Greens/Labor marginals (though these seats would be a much lower priority than winning balance of power in the Senate).

--
Adrian Whitehead

VoteClimate.org.au

0403 735 118

............................

and last but not least this on Get Up via YouTube

 

 


Posted by editor at 7:09 PM NZT

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