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ACHTUNG
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Watching the 4 Corners expose on the Soviet mole in ASIO I was struck by how unimpressive the people featured in this were. The Australian intelligence service betrayal by this senior espionage supervisor in the 1970s and 1980s was done for cash. These tawdry people playing cloak and dagger in the shadows reflected badly on this state funded service. These operations grew out of the Second World War and brought that mindset to peacetime. Selling secrets to the Soviets for large amounts of cash and getting away with it for decades tells us just how ineffective these services are.
Fresh
Indigenous Australians make up just under 4% of the population; and right now they are in the national spotlight. The coming October 14th referendum about amending the Australian Constitution to recognise First Nation’s peoples and the creation of an advisory voice to parliament on issues directly effecting them has thrust many into uncomfortable places. Not everyone feels at home being a spokesperson for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander affairs. In light of this, it is not easy being black right now.
Culture Fresh Politics
Down in Tassie things are different to the rest of Australia. The upside down world in Tasmania has the Liberal state government supporting a Yes vote in the Voice referendum, whilst local Aboriginal groups want a No vote. The polls are predicting a rare win for Yes in the Apple Isle, whereas the mainland story is predicted to be all about No. Why is this so? Tasmania is infamous for massacring most of its Indigenous population back in the day. Perhaps this has something to do with the apparently anomalous situation happening there in relation to First Nations recognition in the Australian Constitution and an Indigenous Voice to Parliament.
Culture Fresh Politics
There is talk of the huge cost to Australians of the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS). The NDIS mess is made by bureaucrats. A worthy idea at heart the NDIS has been overloaded with many unnecessary protocols. The fact that individuals on the scheme with lifelong conditions are made to front an annual review panel to prove their disability is the perfect example of this. Who benefits from this? The bureaucrats involved, of course, they create employment and working hours for themselves to conduct these unnecessary reviews. Someone who is blind from birth is not going to suddenly see – no matter your religious beliefs about whether miracles exist. A quadriplegic or paraplegic should not have to prove their status every year. This is red tape wastage that makes the NDIS much more expensive than it need be.
Big congratulations to the Swans for their victory over the Giants at the SCG. It did not look like happening for much of the afternoon, as GWS were on top for three quarters. The Sydney Swans Qualifying Final win report card must pay the ultimate […]
Fresh Big congratulations to the Swans for their victory over the Giants at the SCG. It did not look like happening for much of the afternoon, as GWS were on top for three quarters. The Sydney Swans Qualifying Final win report card must pay the ultimate […]
Fresh
The ACCC stands for Australian Competition and Consumer Commission. Did you note that term ‘Competition’? This body is supposed to ensure that healthy levels of competition exist in markets. Yet, we in Australia have the highest levels of market concentration ever seen in our history. ACCC failings: What have they been doing? Down under in Oz we pay lip service to things to avoid actually doing anything about scams and fudges in the business world. Toothless tigers are our speciality when we establish the various commissions and overseeing bodies. Governments make sure that regulators like the ACCC don’t have the funding or the necessary connections to really achieve what their remit states.
The Sydney Swans AFL team made the finals in 2023. This was an achievement, as for much of the season injuries and form conspired to make this look unlikely. In a hope that AI might have some answers, I asked AI about the Sydney Swans and their season. So, John Longmire, if you get the chance to read this, may there be something of use in what Chat GPT had to say on the matter. Personally, I was a bit impressed, as the copy was not mere waffle on the topic but had a few pertinent points to make. Of course, my question contained the necessary qualifications to hone a reasonable answer.
Ancient royal soothsayers used to predict the future by throwing sticks and knucklebones on the floor and seeing what kind of patterns they formed. Today, we have economists to perform the same kind of thing but with formulars in dusty textbooks to guide them. There are strict rules around economic behaviours and outcomes like inflation. Different parts of the economy are linked, in their minds, like the unemployment rate with the level of inflation. They have been taught by their professors and textbooks to abide by calculations and processes considered to be carved in stone. Economics is fundamentally about human behaviours in the marketplace. The history of humanity tells us that there is only one thing that you can rely on and that is the unreliability of humans. Economists and soothsayers: Skin in the game.
10 years of Liberal/National federal governments stripped the public service of 15, 000 jobs and opened the door for consultants PwC, KPMG, EY, and Deloitte to feast on government contracts to the tune of billions of dollars. Coalition responsible for consulting crisis, as insider mates shuffle jobs between government and the big 4 consultancy/auditing firms to ensure the flow of business and big bucks. Four Corners has revealed the incestuous relationships in the Department of Defence and KPMG via whistleblowers telling their story about what has been going on. Pigs with snouts in the trough comes to mind as an analogy about what has been occurring.
AFL footy is a different game in the current clime. It started with outlawing the bump to protect the head. Players were told if you choose to bump you are likely to be suspended if you make contact with the head. Now, if you tackle too ferociously and bring the player to ground and he hits his head you can get rubbed out for 3 weeks, in many instances. 26 players have been suspended in 2023 for these kinds of things. AFL footy is a different game these days. Looking ahead the evolution of the game is probably morphing into a non-contact sport like soccer. The contact will not survive the civilising of our recreational activities in the future, I bet. There are very real issues emerging in both the men’s and women’s’ games in regard to the wellbeing of the players going forward.
It is time to call in the exterminators, according to the Senate review into consultancy firms preying on governments in Australia. These bloodsucking accountants and management consultants have managed to extract some $20 billion over the last 10 years. This is a direct result of the neoliberal push to privatise governments and their services. The public service has been gutted by a decade of conservative LNP government providing wealth to their mates via outsourcing to these multinational consultancy firms. Government pests: An infestation of accountants sucking the life and wealth out of Australia.
Robodebt was an ideological attack on the welfare system by the Coalition for economic and political gain. When they were unable to find the billions of dollars of claimed to have been rorted, they confabulated them via illegal means. Scott Morrison bragged about being a Robodebt welfare cop in his public announcements as social services minister. If he is not ultimately responsible for a scheme that has cost the lives of the innocent and vulnerable Australians who is. If Scott Morrison is not responsible for the $1.8 billion lost in a settled class action against the government who is.
The Coalition in opposition has voted against legislation designed to halt the massive increases to energy costs for Australian households due to the gas company cartel and its control of that market. The Coalition has, also, voted against the creation of a future fund designed […]
The leaders of the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) are calling for unemployment to rise. Yes, the RBA want more Aussies out of work so they can slay the dragon they call inflation. You may not have been aware that for the last 50 years the economists at the RBA have adjudged full employment as an unemployment rate of 4.5%. That equates to around 500, 000 ordinary Australians being out of work. These are the sacrificial bodies and souls, apparently, necessary for the economy to work without high inflation. I have an alternative suggestion. Australians: Is it time to eat the rich?
Watching the 4 Corners expose on the Soviet mole in ASIO I was struck by how unimpressive the people featured in this were. The Australian intelligence service betrayal by this senior espionage supervisor in the 1970s and 1980s was done for cash. These tawdry people playing cloak and dagger in the shadows reflected badly on this state funded service. These operations grew out of the Second World War and brought that mindset to peacetime. Selling secrets to the Soviets for large amounts of cash and getting away with it for decades tells us just how ineffective these services are.
