Open Thread – Wed 22 June 2022


Naval Battle in the Gulf of Naples, Pieter Bruegel the Elder, 1560

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Bluey
Bluey
June 23, 2022 2:47 pm

OldOzziesays:
June 23, 2022 at 1:15 pm
Unvaccinated teachers who refused to get a Covid jab are finally allowed to return to work in Victoria – as the state battles a crippling staffing shortage

– Unvaccinated teachers, school staff and childcare workers can resume work
– Mandate which required those workers to be triple vaccinated will end on Friday
– Parents won’t be able to ask for the vaccination status of school staff
– Mandates scrapped in mainstream schools but will continue in specialist school

There’s stacks of help wanted signs in my area. Even got a advertisement in the mail today promoting a career in a well known company. Now that I’m going to be permitted to work again, I’m wondering if it’s worth the effort to find something in Victoria, despite my ties here.
Does anyone trust maximum leader not to play stupid games again? Given his commitment to every virtue signaling stupidity like renewables, and the quality of the liberals, is there going to still be work in a couple of years?

Speedbox
June 23, 2022 2:48 pm

‘Experts’ have been so wrong on just about everything Adam Creighton

Yep. + a gazillion

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
June 23, 2022 2:51 pm

the bush chooks can make a real mess in your garden and you’re not allowed to chase them away

Ahem. I would very much suggest you can – both with kinetic assistance (ie, rocks) and the odd supplemental canine.

The opportunistic pricks with take the path of least resistance and choose somewhere else.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
June 23, 2022 2:52 pm

the average quality of advice has declined, providing the media with a greater number of potentially crowd-pleasing, dubious opinions to promote. Experts get it wrong often because they bear few personal consequences of their advice. The accuracy of past predictions or assessments is rarely checked.

*thunderous applause*

sfw
sfw
June 23, 2022 2:54 pm

Diesel in Mt Beauty this morning $2.50/litre, maybe because the school hols start this weekend and the ski crowd will be up en masse.

Re “60 yrs ago how many housewives would (even if no longer doing) have the following;
Been unable to kill & dress a chook”

When I was around four or five, over 60 years ago, I remember sitting out the back of the outside toilet with my grandmother as she plucked and cleaned a chook before my birthday. My mum, born in the bush could never bring herself to do it, she has a phobia about chook feet, strange.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
June 23, 2022 2:57 pm

Pressure on ADF to recruit amid China aggression
Carly Douglas
CARLY DOUGLAS

The Australian Defence Force has put out an urgent call for young Australians to join the force as pressure sets in amid growing aggression from both China and Russia.

Lieutenant Kunal Ghangas has said the ADF is looking to increase to “about 101,000 people” serving full-time across the defence force by 2040.

“The idea is we have real-life Australian Defence Force members that people in Melbourne can come and have a chat to, rather than just looking at websites and job profiles,” Lt Ghangas told Sky News on Thursday.

Defence Force Recruiting is also currently promoting one of the ADF’s largest careers fairs to showcase opportunities and roles available.

The push for recruits has been developing over several months, with the ADF hoping to grow its ranks to their highest levels since the Vietnam War.

Good luck in recruiting for Special Air Service and the Commando’s.

Tom
Tom
June 23, 2022 3:01 pm

The Democratic Party’s electoral coalition is crumbling. The party is being deserted by the blacks and latinos whose support the party has taken for granted for decades and the November midterm elections are looming as a bloodbath.

At the same time, establishment Republicans have deserted their voters and are enthusiastically supporting the mad remaking of America by the Marxists driving the Biden agenda.

A brilliant piece of journalism by Tucker Carlson Tonight.

Zipster
Zipster
June 23, 2022 3:01 pm
Bluey
Bluey
June 23, 2022 3:02 pm

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha I’d suggest there’s problems recruiting full stop. The push for DIE, women in combat, etc. etc. there’s not a career there for blokes the way there was. Why stick your neck out for people that hate you?
I wouldn’t enlist these days. Spend more time getting lectured about social justice, equity and diversity than doing the job.

John of Mel
John of Mel
June 23, 2022 3:12 pm

The Australian Defence Force has put out an urgent call for young Australians to join the force

Is being in “transition” or a representative of an approved minority group a requirement? Or have the pools of available candidates from these categories been depleted already?

Morsie
Morsie
June 23, 2022 3:26 pm

Enjoyed the comments about voiding insurance above.Had a lovely experience when living in Malaysia.Had to cancel a trip because of illness so the airline ticket was made open ended.
Tried to claim on travel insurance to recover hotel costs etc.
Oh no was the response “Your trip has not been cancelled, it has been postponed, so no you cannot claim.”
So says I , does that mean when we rebook the trip , that you will cover us for the new dates.
“Oh no, ” was the response, ” You will need a new policy”.
All of this delivered with the fakest of fake politeness. Topped off with final comment “Anyway it sounds like the medical condition was pre-existing so the claim would be denied anyway” .This was absolute bullshit and based on nothing.Luckily it was only a few hundred bucks .

DrBeauGan
DrBeauGan
June 23, 2022 3:29 pm

Being kind without limit is enabling those who wish to destroy biology and blur reality and this writer, as an adult human female, says no.

Don’t agree, Cassie. I think we should always be kind. In this case, kindness consists of telling them they are nuts. Supporting a delusion is not doing them a kindness.

Boambee John
Boambee John
June 23, 2022 3:38 pm

Experts get it wrong often because they bear few personal consequences of their advice. The accuracy of past predictions or assessments is rarely checked.

The epidemiologist Ferguson from Imperial College has got every one of his predictions wrong this century.

Even after the spectacular failure of his early Kung Flu predictions (and his open contempt for them, demonstrated by him ignoring restrictions based on them), media intellectual giants and bureaucrats were still seeking his later (equally wrong) predictions months after.

DrBeauGan
DrBeauGan
June 23, 2022 3:40 pm

Zipster, it isn’t sentient because it has no sensors. It knows nothing about the world, its knowledge is confined to language.

hzhousewife
hzhousewife
June 23, 2022 3:43 pm

Dr Collins was approached to represent the Ten Network and Wilkinson.

Did he agree to do so?

Dot
Dot
June 23, 2022 3:44 pm

DIE?

Diversity, inclusion & equity?

China has more useful idiots in the west than the USSR ever dreamt of controlling.

*Hurry up and surrender, bigot!*

GreyRanga
GreyRanga
June 23, 2022 3:44 pm

Agree DBG

hzhousewife
hzhousewife
June 23, 2022 3:46 pm

Just this week I randomly joked to a someone whose young relative has been in the Army for a few years now, and asked “have they got him learning Chinese yet?” and the answer was “yes”.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
June 23, 2022 3:46 pm

The WEF’s latest treachery, as advised by more WHO ‘experts’: SuperClap (the NT News):

Experts believe a recently discovered new strain of super gonorrhoea poses a “major global threat” after an Austrian man caught the drug-resistant version of the sexually transmitted infection (STI).

In a case report published last month in the journal Eurosurveillance, doctors appear to have found the first gonorrhoea strain since 2018 to feature resistance to drugs.

And:

Lead author of the report, Dr Sonja Pleininger, from the Austrian Agency for Health and Food Safety, said such strains “poses a major global public health threat”.

“If such strains manage to establish a sustained transmission, many gonorrhoea cases might become untreatable,” she said.

And:

Gonorrhoea is the second most common STI in Britain, with almost 60,000 people catching it each year. In America, about 680,000 get infected each year too.

Symptoms include a thick green or yellow discharge from the vagina or penis, and pain when urinating.

If left untreated, the disease can lead to serious complications including infertility and potentially life-threatening pelvic inflammatory disease in women. In pregnant women, it can also cause permanent blindness for newborns.

I mean obviously, this is the latest instalment in Klaus’ plan to depopulate the Earth before 2040, and by 80% through climate change and war and famine and various forms of pestilence, including this one.

There are none so blind as those who cannot see this. Mentally sick denialists. Scoffers and sneerers who will all be dead soon.

Only by following the True Path, and selling your boat will you be saved.

John Sheldrick
June 23, 2022 3:47 pm

Unemployment in the USA expected rise over the next several years. Is this what Australia can expect too?

Former US Treasury Secretary Larry Summers weighed in on the topic recently but was blunter with his message. “We need five years of unemployment above 5% to contain inflation – in other words, we need two years of 7.5% unemployment or five years of 6% unemployment or one year of 10% unemployment,” Summers said while speaking in London.

That would indicate an immediate 1.4% decline in employment within the next few months on the low end of his estimate. Another 75 basis point rate hike is not off the table for July as the Fed has become hawkish in reversing its failed policies. Regardless, the US workforce is expected to take a big hit in the near future due to fiscal and policy mismanagement. The cost of basic necessities is rising, housing is unaffordable, and countless people will lose their jobs. The worst is yet to come.

https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/armstrongeconomics101/economics/unemployment-expected-to-rise/

Mater
June 23, 2022 3:52 pm

The Australian Defence Force has put out an urgent call for young Australians to join the force as pressure sets in amid growing aggression from both China and Russia.

What? Seriously?

Face the bullets for a system that locked you in your home, for an open ended period, for fear that you might get the sniffles?

A system that shoots you with beanbag rounds for exercising the (obviously) illusory rights that you might now be expected to die for?

GO GET FUCKED!

John Sheldrick
June 23, 2022 3:53 pm

Only by following the True Path, and selling your boat will you be saved.

I don’t have a boat. How about selling the photograph of gold bars that I have.? The photograph I mean and not the gold bars.

Farmer Gez
Farmer Gez
June 23, 2022 3:55 pm

TaliDan is losing a few of the worshipful ministers this the coming election.
Pakula, Merlino and Neville are not standing again.

Bluey
Bluey
June 23, 2022 4:04 pm

Farmer Gezsays:
June 23, 2022 at 3:55 pm
TaliDan is losing a few of the worshipful ministers this the coming election.
Pakula, Merlino and Neville are not standing again.

Pakula was the one who turned the mob loose on a nobody wasn’t it? Absolute scumbag. I’d like to see my local member disappear too, but it’s not likely. Only ever seen the wanker in stuff promoting Dan, never locally. Never got anything back from his office when I’ve written. Safe Labor seat. Mp who’s done nothing outside politics. Everything that’s wrong with the system….

Grrr. I’m getting annoyed about the election already.

Wally Dalí
Wally Dalí
June 23, 2022 4:12 pm

Maintain the rage Bluey

John Sheldrick
June 23, 2022 4:13 pm

– Matt Kean says lights are on 24-7 in his Hornsby office because of a wiring fault

or is it a loser error?

LOL. Apparently on hearing this on talk back radio, a person who is a qualified electrician came online a said – “Incorrect ! A wiring fault will cause the lights not to work……………………….

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
June 23, 2022 4:15 pm

Face the bullets for a system that locked you in your home, for an open ended period, for fear that you might get the sniffles?

Face the bullets for a system that tells you, you have no right to be on a land that was stolen from the indigenous..

Bluey
Bluey
June 23, 2022 4:18 pm

Wally Dalísays:
June 23, 2022 at 4:12 pm
Maintain the rage Bluey

Rage? I’m not terribly adverse to moving to slitting throats at this point. Maybe that might make an impression. Some of the largest protests in Victoria’s history certainly didn’t.

Mater
June 23, 2022 4:23 pm

Face the bullets for a system that tells you, you have no right to be on a land that was stolen from the indigenous..

Face the bullets for a system that demonstrably and actively discriminates against you when applying for a Public Service job*?

* See my thread from yesterday.

bespoke
bespoke
June 23, 2022 4:31 pm

Winston Smithsays:
June 23, 2022 at 12:47 pm
Calli:

– change power point

I have a power point/light switch in the laundry that needs replacing.
If I do the job, I void my house insurance.
Credentialism.

Chicken?

How are they going to tell?

Top Ender
Top Ender
June 23, 2022 4:36 pm

Thousands of Australians have called for Lisa Wilkinson to be sacked as the fallout from her controversial Logies speech escalates.

Daily Mail

Zipster
Zipster
June 23, 2022 4:46 pm

Zipster, it isn’t sentient because it has no sensors. It knows nothing about the world, its knowledge is confined to language.

It’s certainly not sentient in the sense a human is. It’s answers though are pretty spectacular. Google isn’t about to let the general public interact with it. Last time microsoft allowed the public to interact with an AI, it was taught a repertoire of obscenities.

sentient
/?s?nt??nt,?s?n?(?)nt/
Learn to pronounce
adjective
able to perceive or feel things.

Is answering rationally though text a form of perception?

These AIs raise more questions than they answer.

AIs with vision are coming, dale-2 is another spectacular example.

I am pretty convinced we are not far from general AI and super-intelligence. The world is going to look very different in a decade.

Zipster
Zipster
June 23, 2022 4:57 pm
Ed Case
Ed Case
June 23, 2022 4:57 pm

It’s seems to be a huge story with journalists, but newspaper reporting has been almost non existent.
Until Lisa’s speech.
I’d say her credibility is now shot to bits, how can she seriously claim to have been unaware that her speech would most likely kill any prospect of a Trial ever happening?
Very suspicious.

Roger
Roger
June 23, 2022 4:57 pm

QLD, state of corruption:

4 Labor MPs failed to attend a Crime and Misconduct C’tee meeting today, meaning a decision on releasing the Crime & Corruption Commission’s letter outlining the costs of their investigation of Jacki Trad’s role in appointing a senior public servant has been postponed for the second time.

The Committee had to adjourn as no business could be conducted without the Labor members present.

bespoke
bespoke
June 23, 2022 5:01 pm

Rogersays:
June 23, 2022 at 4:57 pm

Has the Governor General any power to make them?

Carpe Jugulum
Carpe Jugulum
June 23, 2022 5:08 pm

Only by following the True Path, and selling your boat will you be saved.

The only way you will get the keys to my boat will be from my cold dead hands

After i run out of ammo

Zyconoclast
Zyconoclast
June 23, 2022 5:09 pm

The head of an infamous Pakistani child s3x grooming gang has been revealed to have been serving as a welfare rights officer for the local government council, a major child s3x abuse report has revealed.

Shabir Ahmed, who led the Muslim Rochdale child r@pe gang, has been identified as “Offender A” by Sky News in a child s3xual exploitation in Oldham report this month, which showed that while he was abusing children, he was employed by the local Labour-run council. Despite the Greater Manchester Police force being aware of allegations against Ahmed and his position as a welfare officer for the council, the police force failed to notify the council.

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
June 23, 2022 5:10 pm

Boambee Johnsays:

June 23, 2022 at 3:38 pm

Experts get it wrong often because they bear few personal consequences of their advice. The accuracy of past predictions or assessments is rarely checked.

The epidemiologist Ferguson from Imperial College has got every one of his predictions wrong this century.

He was the first one to come to mind reading Creighton’s piece.
The only thing I will take issue with is “this century”.
Apart from Kung Flu, SARS and MERS he also spectacularly fucked up BSE (Mad Cow Disease) modelling as well, predicting Armageddon, resulting in the destruction of hundreds of thousands of livestock.
FMD, anyone with a shred of decency and self reflection would have said to themselves, “Maybe I’m no good at this” and put the cue in the rack long ago.

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
June 23, 2022 5:12 pm

The Committee had to adjourn as no business could be conducted without the Labor members present.

Dock their pay for the trough gobbling they get for being on a committee

Zyconoclast
Zyconoclast
June 23, 2022 5:12 pm

100-MAN brawl breaks out in front of terrified families… sparked by WATER PISTOL prank at Berlin outdoor pool

This is the moment a mass brawl broke out at an outdoor swimming pool in Berlin on Sunday, with 100 young men fighting each other.

The huge fight broke out after one group sprayed another with a water pistol at Sommerbad am Insulaner in the German capital’s Steglitz district.

This is said to have developed into a verbal and then a physical argument.

A total of 13 police vehicles arrived with one hundred officers rushed to the scene and arrested several people.

The by-stander footage shows how security and failed to prevent a fight breaking out, but within seconds there was nothing they could do but stand and watch.

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
June 23, 2022 5:13 pm

GO GET FUCKED!

So I take it your leaning slightly towards a “No” at this stage?

bespoke
bespoke
June 23, 2022 5:15 pm

666.666.666.69

Mater
June 23, 2022 5:15 pm

So I take it your leaning slightly towards a “No” at this stage?

Apologies for the ambiguity…No!

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
June 23, 2022 5:18 pm

Chicken?

How are they going to tell?

Forensic arson investigators are very good at identifying the origin of a fire (or simultaneous origins in some cases).
Why blow up an insurance recovery of $500k minimum for the sake of a 15 minute cash job by the sparkie (no matter how remote the odds)?

Ed Case
Ed Case
June 23, 2022 5:19 pm

This David Sharaz guy:
Any chance he could be a Spook?

bespoke
bespoke
June 23, 2022 5:28 pm

It all colour coded, Sancho.
Get tester and some Woodstock cans.

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
June 23, 2022 5:28 pm

Christian Wilkins should answer the call from the ADF to join up.

There’s some like minded serving members, some in relativity high ranks, who love to throw on a frock.

Mater
June 23, 2022 5:34 pm

The Australian Defence Force has put out an urgent call for young Australians to join the force as pressure sets in amid growing aggression from both China and Russia.

If I get deployed, who’s go8ng to protect my wife and kids from our own Government?

Let VicPol do it. They’ve get the shiny new kit, the flash new weapons, the itchy trigger fingers, and a nasty little violent streak which obviously needs an outlet.

calli
calli
June 23, 2022 5:41 pm

The epidemiologist Ferguson from Imperial College has got every one of his predictions wrong this century.

Got it “wrong”, did he?

He didn’t even believe his own bullsh*t. He was sprung during the lockdown he promoted visiting his trollop.

johanna
johanna
June 23, 2022 5:43 pm

The Swamp in the UK is still hanging on:

The British government will finally be able to overrule European judges on the deportation of illegal migrants under reforms to the UK’s human rights rules to be introduced to the House of Commons on Wednesday.

Following the “scandalous” intervention by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) to prevent a deportation flight of illegal aliens to Rwanda earlier this month, Boris Johnson’s government will publish its long-awaited Bill of Rights to the Parliament, which among other issues, will empower ministers to reject rulings from judges in Strasbourg, notably on the deportation of illegal migrants.

Though the UK officially left the European Union in 2020, the country is still a part of the Council of Europe and its subsidiary ECHR, as it is technically a separate institution from the EU, though so closely aligned that they share the same flag, anthem and are located in the same ‘European Quarter’ campus in Strasbourg, France.

Deputy Prime Minister and Justice Secretary Dominic Raab, who will introduce the legislation, said according to The Times: “We will be making it crystal clear that parliament has the last word when it comes to the legislative function and the [London] Supreme Court has the last word when it comes to the judicial function.

“We will be very clear that UK courts will not need to take into account case law from Strasbourg and they are explicitly free to diverge from it.”

Baby steps. Note that they ‘will not need’ to take case law into account, but they still can. They are merely free to ignore it if they want to, which, judging by history, they won’t.

Sigh.

Roger
Roger
June 23, 2022 5:44 pm

Has the Governor General any power to make them?

No, bespoke, even if she was so inclined, which I doubt.

cohenite
June 23, 2022 5:44 pm

Christian Wilkins should answer the call from the ADF to join up.

There’s some like minded serving members, some in relativity high ranks, who love to throw on a frock.

Some inspiration also from the US.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
June 23, 2022 5:44 pm

Let VicPol do it. They’ve get the shiny new kit, the flash new weapons, the itchy trigger fingers, and a nasty little violent streak which obviously needs an outlet.

From watching the vision of that appalling display at the Shrine, I would suggest that VicJack Inc – enthusiastic as they may be – have some work to do in terms of tactics, coherence, communications and the ability to operate such weaponry in a competent manner.

Boambee John
Boambee John
June 23, 2022 5:46 pm

Ed Casesays:
June 23, 2022 at 5:19 pm
This David Sharaz guy:
Any chance he could be a Spook?

Maybe a Flamer?

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
June 23, 2022 5:47 pm

Bradley Pen Dragon: Premier Mark McGowan says he is not concerned a ‘lynch-mob’ of parents hunting him down
Shannon Hampton
The West Australian
Thu, 23 June 2022 1:02PM

Premier Mark McGowan has admitted he would prefer if paedophile Bradley Pen Dragon was still locked up and says he is not worried about the prospect of a “lynch-mob” of concerned parents hunting down the “strange and offensive person”.

Mr McGowan’s comments on Thursday came after it was revealed parents had launched into a social media witch-hunt to find Dragon after his release from prison this week and that it was believed he was living in Perth’s south-eastern suburbs.

It also came as Dragon’s most recent victim, a mother who was held at knife point by the serial criminal in front of her sick 11-month-old baby in Mt Lawley in 2012, said she was terrified he was free, but supported “vigilance not vigilantism”.

Asked if he was worried a “lynch mob awaits him” if Dragon’s location was identified, Mr McGowan said he was “not worried about that”.

“Look, he’s a very strange and offensive person,” he said. “The police are watching him very, very closely.

A notorious kiddy fiddler. Last seen, rising slowly to a stout limb, with a mob of angry parents chanting “Yo heave ho, and up he goes…”

Dr Faustus
Dr Faustus
June 23, 2022 5:48 pm

Apart from Kung Flu, SARS and MERS he also spectacularly fucked up BSE (Mad Cow Disease) modelling…

Prick of a creature.

I’ve had Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease for the past 20+ years thanks to him.
It’s only just cleared up.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
June 23, 2022 5:48 pm

Forensic arson investigators are very good at identifying the origin of a fire (or simultaneous origins in some cases)

Indeed they are. Amazing what they find, when they know what to look for.

Hypothetically, and apropos of absolutely nothing – if someone were to upgrade their insurance on a property 12 months or less before it burns, those investigators will rightly or wrongly be all over you like Brittany Higgins on a vodka cruiser.

GreyRanga
GreyRanga
June 23, 2022 5:52 pm

Sancho Panzersays:
June 23, 2022 at 5:18 pm
Chicken?

How are they going to tell?

Forensic arson investigators are very good at identifying the origin of a fire (or simultaneous origins in some cases).
Why blow up an insurance recovery of $500k minimum for the sake of a 15 minute cash job by the sparkie (no matter how remote the odds)?

There was a insurance conference in NYC in the early 90’s. They got forensic and electrical guys to go over all the electrical fires for the previous few years. None of them were caused by faults. The insurance companies were pissed.

Dr Faustus
Dr Faustus
June 23, 2022 5:53 pm

…be all over you like Brittany Higgins on a vodka cruiser.

You seem to be suffering from contempt.

Mater
June 23, 2022 5:57 pm

From watching the vision of that appalling display at the Shrine, I would suggest that VicJack Inc – enthusiastic as they may be – have some work to do in terms of tactics, coherence, communications and the ability to operate such weaponry in a competent manner.

I’m happy to approve their ‘On-The-Job-Training’ application.
They have my full blessing.

Sadly, in the event of conscription, they’re the bastards who’ll be in the ‘reserved occupations’.

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
June 23, 2022 5:57 pm

Oops.
Accidentally reported Dr F at 5:48.

Bluey
Bluey
June 23, 2022 5:58 pm

Matersays:
June 23, 2022 at 5:34 pm
The Australian Defence Force has put out an urgent call for young Australians to join the force as pressure sets in amid growing aggression from both China and Russia.

If I get deployed, who’s go8ng to protect my wife and kids from our own Government?

Let VicPol do it. They’ve get the shiny new kit, the flash new weapons, the itchy trigger fingers, and a nasty little violent streak which obviously needs an outlet.

Think it was about a decade ago now, the federal government spent more outfitting the federal police tactical response teams than it would have cost to work up another infantry battalion. Maybe it was the army was griping because the Solomon islands was a deployment at the time, I forget the exact circumstances.

GreyRanga
GreyRanga
June 23, 2022 5:58 pm

Boambee Johnsays:
June 23, 2022 at 5:46 pm
Ed Casesays:
June 23, 2022 at 5:19 pm
This David Sharaz guy:
Any chance he could be a Spook?

Maybe a Flamer?

Probably a Flaming Spook, worked for the SIS. They’ve had plenty of those in the past.

Roger
Roger
June 23, 2022 5:59 pm

WHO’s Dr “Ted Ross” reportedly now saying the accidental lab leak covid hypothesis is plausible.

Ed Case
Ed Case
June 23, 2022 5:59 pm

Maybe a Flamer?
No maybe about that.
Is he a Spook as well?

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
June 23, 2022 5:59 pm

Let me give you a tour. This is the main bedroom and here’s the kitchen, they’re owned by the Federal government. The laundry and loungeroom are owned by the State government. The other two bedrooms are owned by the bank, and this here is what I own! The toilet!

Shared equity schemes are the latest in housing affordability fads – and the NSW version makes zero rational sense (23 Jun)

During the Federal election, Labor spruiked a policy for a government shared equity scheme of up to 40 per cent of the purchase price and the Coalition trotted out a similar policy funded from personal superannuation rather than the taxpayer.

This week, the NSW government announced its own shared equity scheme as part of its budget measures. This version proposes the government pay up to 40 per cent of the purchase price of a new dwelling and up to 30 per cent of an existing dwelling while the purchaser pays a minimum deposit of 2 per cent.

It’s going to be messy, especially when the politically favoured special people who get the loans don’t make the repayments and default. Disentangling who actually owns what would then be an epic multisided lawyer fight.

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
June 23, 2022 6:00 pm

We can be kind on a personal basis, but being “kind” on a societal level has led us to this state of disarray, confusion and ludicrousness, to a state where we’re expected to acknowledge lies over truth and we’re we being compelled to change not just our language but our very perception of what is reality and biology.

I don’t disagree. Anything that I can do on a societal level to obliterate this nonsense, count me in, from writing on blogs or in articles signalling objection, or attending demonstrations.

Even on a personal level, as my examples re trans individuals suggest, I try to insert the seed of doubt wherever possible in the case of gender, and on leftist assumptions in general. Occasionally the personal and the political intersect in a train wreck – as when my daughter-in-law was shocked and horrified to see Hairy and me on SBS TV in the front row at CPAC on US election night. She said the other day that was almost a step too far for her to cope with (she is American and a true Trump hater). I kindly pointed out to her that her anti-Trumpism was almost a step to far for us, so it works both ways. She backed off then. Managing the fraught ‘societal level’ can be a test within families as well as out at large.

Roger
Roger
June 23, 2022 6:01 pm

I have to keep my world weary cynicism in check when my serving soldier son visits.

Don’t want to demoralise him.

Ed Case
Ed Case
June 23, 2022 6:03 pm

Meme for those with a Hard On for intervening in the Ukraine SMO.

Boambee John
Boambee John
June 23, 2022 6:04 pm

Dr Faustussays:
June 23, 2022 at 5:48 pm
Apart from Kung Flu, SARS and MERS he also spectacularly fucked up BSE (Mad Cow Disease) modelling…

Prick of a creature.

I’ve had Creutzfeldt-Jakob Disease for the past 20+ years thanks to him.
It’s only just cleared up.

My family also had it. I certainly won’t bother to donate blood, after being a Leper for 35 years (since RTA in very late 1986.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
June 23, 2022 6:05 pm

Maybe a Flamer?

No maybe about that.
Is he a Spook as well?

Ray Gillette from Archer.

thefrollickingmole
thefrollickingmole
June 23, 2022 6:06 pm

Any chance he could be a Spook?

Maybe a Flamer?

Combine the 2 and you get a ..

Spomer?
Flook?

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
June 23, 2022 6:07 pm

Wy do I alwus leave off the second o in too?

I blame the keyboard. It couldn’t possibly be me.

Colonel Crispin Berka
Colonel Crispin Berka
June 23, 2022 6:10 pm

A landmark court ruling finds Xiaojun Chen was an employee of Hungry Panda when he died after being hit by a bus in Sydney, entitling his widow and children to compensation.

Translated:
The judicial branch amassed more power for the executive branch in a ruling that in yet another circumstance SMBs cannot survive without becoming Big Business and freelancers are less free than they imagined.
(Because power and responsibility are inseparable.)

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
June 23, 2022 6:13 pm

We’ve spent more than six months eating in England during the wrong period, so we can’t give blood in Australia either due to BSE concerns. We are impure from wayback.

It doesn’t apply in England of course.

Just another one of our OZ public health freak outs.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
June 23, 2022 6:13 pm

I have to keep my world weary cynicism in check when my serving soldier son visits.

Wish him all the best, from one of the “in – betweeners.”

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
June 23, 2022 6:17 pm

From the Oz – I’ve posted the whole article.

After Lisa Wilkinson’s remarks about Brittany Higgins, can Bruce Lehrmann ever receive a fair trial?CHRIS MERRITT

15 minutes ago June 23, 2022

By now, Lisa Wilkinson must understand the truly catastrophic consequences of her ill-advised remarks about Brittany Higgins.

The real risk of a stretch in prison means she has no option but to surrender to Shane Drumgold, the ACT Director of Public Prosecutions, and provide every undertaking he has asked for – no matter how humiliating.

If all Drumgold is after is a promise that she will mend her ways and respect the presumption of innocence, it will amount to one of the greatest exercises of prosecutorial restraint.

This is the culmination of a regrettable period in which, to borrow a phrase from ACT Chief Justice Lucy McCallum, the boundary between allegations and proven facts has been obliterated by those who should know better.

This affair is far from finalised. But when Drumgold sought his undertakings, both sides would have known that formal legal proceedings over Wilkinson’s remarks could have had a very different result.

Those remarks cut across a pending jury trial by implicitly accepting the truth of allegations by Higgins.

Seven years inside – or a fine of $112,000 – is the maximum penalty under the Criminal Code of the ACT for recklessly publishing material that could cause a miscarriage of justice in a legal proceeding.

If that sounds harsh, consider the penalty for publishing material with the intention of causing a miscarriage of justice: ten years in prison or a fine of $160,000.

This helps explain why Wilkinson was well advised to hire Dr Matt Collins QC, one of the nation’s leading media lawyers, soon after he told a television audience on Wednesday there was a “serious possibility” the authorities might consider laying charges over her remarks about Higgins.

Based on what is already on the public record, and the adverse impact of her remarks on the trial of the man accused of raping Higgins, a tougher approach by Drumgold would have presented Collins with the challenge of a lifetime.

Proceedings under the Criminal Code could have come down to an argument over penalty: should Wilkinson go to prison – thereby ending her career – or merely be hit with a fine?

This woman’s fate is a second-order issue. The real problem is whether Bruce Lehrmann, the man charged with sexually assaulting Higgins in Parliament House, can ever receive a fair trial.

To ensure that happens, McCallum will need to overcome impediments that have been faced by few others.

She delayed the trial, hoping that the passage of time would ease the prejudicial impact of Wilkinson’s remarks on potential jurors.

Wilkinson, according to the Chief Justice, had “completely obliterated” the boundary between an allegation of rape and a proven fact.

What we are witnessing is not merely the fallout from one journalist’s brain snap. This is what happens when the presumption of innocence is discarded – not just by a handful of journalists, but by politicians who seem to believe this doctrine can be applied selectively.

If Wilkinson is in trouble for making statements that implicitly endorse the truth of the Higgins allegation – and that is what McCallum asserted – what are we to make of the conduct of others in public life?

In particular, what does this say about Scott Morrison’s apology to Higgins for “the terrible things that took place” in Parliament House?

At least the former prime minister tried later to walk this back by saying it was “by no means a reflection on the matters before the court”.

That was back in February, possibly too far back to influence a jury. But it was the same month in which the National Press Club provided a forum for Higgins and gave her a standing ovation. Was that another example of implicitly accepting the truth of her allegation?

If not, why was she there sharing a platform with Grace Tame, whose accusations of sexual assault have been tested and upheld in a court of law?

McCallum made the point on Tuesday there had been a “seamless elision” of the stories of the two women. They were not in the same category, the Chief Justice said.

Nobody should ever forget that former attorney-general Christian Porter was hounded from office on the basis of an unprovable accusation, which he denied, of sexual misconduct as a teenager with a woman who is now deceased.

It has subsequently emerged, in a book by Aaron Patrick, that one of those promoting that allegation had a youthful sexual relationship with Porter.

McCallum is duty-bound to ensure that Lehrmann receives a fair trial. But the government of the ACT has limited her options.

In May last year, before Lehrmann was committed for trial, this column warned that the intense publicity that had been given to the Higgins allegation made it essential for this case to be tried without a jury.

It is now too late to change the law to give McCallum the option of running this trial without a jury, which has long been a fallback in NSW.

Even now, a spokesman for ACT Attorney-General Shane Rattenbury says the territory is not considering judge-alone trials at this stage.

“But we will see if there are any particular lessons to learn from this high-profile case,” the spokesman says.

For Wilkinson, it looks like the worst she will face will be another grovel – which will be the third she has been required to make this month.

She has already apologised for making light of the war in Ukraine and for accusing former MP Andrew Laming of taking an inappropriate photograph of a woman.

For Lehrmann, justice now depends on jurors having poor memories.

Roger
Roger
June 23, 2022 6:22 pm

Wish him all the best, from one of the “in – betweeners.”

Will do, Zulu.

He may be off to the US soon. Top secret!

Ed Case
Ed Case
June 23, 2022 6:24 pm

Any chance he could be a Spook?

Maybe a Flamer?

Being a Flamer goes with the territory.
Remember Ian Fleming, Noel Coward, Burgess, MacLean & Philby?
Course you do …

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
June 23, 2022 6:25 pm

Calli @05:41
visiting his trollop.

Thanks for resurrecting that word Calli – doesn’t get used enough these days.

Why does someone named Lisa spring to mind?

thefrollickingmole
thefrollickingmole
June 23, 2022 6:26 pm
johanna
johanna
June 23, 2022 6:26 pm

Top Ender:

It was quite a few years ago when ASIO became public knowledge, and at one stage opened their files to various wannabee activists and so on.

A lot found to their chagrin they either didn’t have a file, or had one with the contents being disappointedly small.

TE, I vividly remember being with a very prominent leftish Canberra bloke when he got his ASIO file. We had known each other very well (no, not like that) in the 1970s.

Well, what a garbled, meaningless mishmash it was. A lot of it was factually wrong (e.g. he was not even in the ACT at the time) – it seems that ASIO didn’t do a lot of quality control when it came to their paid informants.

I have mentioned this story previously on Sinc’s, but here it is for new readers.

I was at a dinner party in the 1970s in Canberra where a drunken ASIO officer got under the table and crawled around on all fours and barked like a dog.

Hey, the rest of us were drunk as well, but, really. There are limits.

Ed Case
Ed Case
June 23, 2022 6:26 pm

For Lehrmann, justice now depends on jurors having poor memories.

Settle down, there was never going to be any Trial.

thefrollickingmole
thefrollickingmole
June 23, 2022 6:27 pm
Colonel Crispin Berka
Colonel Crispin Berka
June 23, 2022 6:28 pm

ACTU now trolling JC and SRR.

ACTU Secretary Sally McManus says the Reserve Bank is out of touch and living in “boomer fantasy land” if it thinks workers can afford real cuts to their wages.
The union boss said the RBA governor Philip Lowe changed his tune in his speech earlier this week about wages.
“He was the one who said that so long as wages keep up with inflation and productivity, they’re not
inflationary,” she told RN Breakfast.

thefrollickingmole
thefrollickingmole
June 23, 2022 6:32 pm

As usual ed-Mongs list of “flamers” includes non poo pushers.

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
June 23, 2022 6:36 pm

I am quite happy not using any pronouns but the ones that I grew up with and making pronoun determinations of the basis of traditional English usage and indicative male/female allocations.
If someone looks or acts like a man but has women’s clothing on, then he’s still a ‘sir’ to me.
I would certainly never assist in any form filling by asking any man if he was pregnant.
Similarly, if a girl or woman is patently female I will not be referring to her as ‘he’.
And if she’s in the maternity ward she will be a pregnant woman and then a breastfeeding mother.

End this nonsense now.

Eyrie
Eyrie
June 23, 2022 6:37 pm

It was quite a few years ago when ASIO became public knowledge, and at one stage opened their files to various wannabee activists and so on.
Uh huh, as if those were the *real* files. Some people will believe anything.

rickw
rickw
June 23, 2022 6:38 pm

Electricity overload..

Go hard or go home.

Just imagining the Vikpol raids on those with unusual electrical activity, to find they’re growing the new cash crop, lettuce.

Ed Case
Ed Case
June 23, 2022 6:38 pm

Nobody should ever forget that former attorney-general Christian Porter was hounded from office on the basis of an unprovable accusation, which he denied, of sexual misconduct as a teenager with a woman who is now deceased.

He wasn’t hounded from Office, but even if he was, what’s … with a woman who is now deceased. got to do with it?

It has subsequently emerged, in a book by Aaron Patrick, that one of those promoting that allegation had a youthful sexual relationship with Porter.

That’s the real story, since this person in central to the Porter Affair, yet the Media is taking her uncorroborated word about all the circumstances as if it’s the truth.

Ed Case
Ed Case
June 23, 2022 6:42 pm

Well, they we either pitchers or catchers, CornHolio.
Seems unimportant, but evidently it’s a huge issue with you.

rickw
rickw
June 23, 2022 6:42 pm

WHO’s Dr “Ted Ross” reportedly now saying the accidental lab leak covid hypothesis is plausible.

CCP cheque bounced?

Indolent
Indolent
June 23, 2022 6:42 pm

Russell Brand – Jimmy Dore on Tucker

This Is EPIC

Megan
Megan
June 23, 2022 6:45 pm

Face the bullets for a system that tells you, you have no right to be on a land that was stolen from the indigenous

I was informed this morning, at a city based university of technology waffle welcome to country, that I am a mere guest in these lands.

It was all I could do to restrain myself from asking how this statement promotes the inclusion the speaker then proceeded to claim her words were dedicated to. Honestly, it was a bundle of ridiculous virtuous word salad. With dressing.

Cassie of Sydney
June 23, 2022 6:46 pm

“Zyconoclastsays:
June 23, 2022 at 5:09 pm”

Here is Mark Steyn’s view on this, uploaded on GB News yesterday. I listened to Steyn describe in detail what happened to one girl and it is very distressing, Steyn doesn’t mince words.

Please listen.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i25RZ8aDxY8

A number of pertinent facts…

Fact 1. There are grooming gangs operating as I write.

Fact 2. Nothing has changed, because the UK police are now totally politicised and will not deal with the problem. They don’t want to be seen as “waaaaacist” or “Islamophobic”. UK police are thoroughly woke and too busy knocking on people’s doors for “offensive” Twitter comments mocking transgenderism than protecting and saving young British white working class girls* from being raped.

Fact 3. The UK Labour party, from Westminster through to local councils, is also to blame. UK Labour is now solely concerned with identity politics and courting minorities, particularly one minority. Rather than trying to protect its traditional base, UK Labour has sought to woo the “Muslim” vote and if that means ignoring the rape and sexual abuse of young white girls in working class town like Rotherham and Oldham……so be it. It is beyond a scandal, it is utterly shocking and depraved.

Fact 4. Those who have tried to speak up about the rape gangs, going back over a decade, are smeared as waaaacists , Islamophobes, white supremacists and neo-Nazis.

Fact 5. Rape is a traditional weapon of Islam used to suppress, intimidate and silence peoples that Islam conquers. It has been this way since Mo the Mass Murderer.

* it should be noted that some Sikh and Hindu girls have been targeted in places like Luton but the Sikh and Hindu communities, given the history of Muslim rape in the Punjab, took matters into their own hands.

rickw
rickw
June 23, 2022 6:47 pm

The Australian Defence Force has put out an urgent call for young Australians to join the force as pressure sets in amid growing aggression from both China and Russia.

The words Get Fucked, spring to mind.

Defending our right to be abused by the fucks in state and federal government. Maybe not.

Dr Faustus
Dr Faustus
June 23, 2022 6:48 pm

I certainly won’t bother to donate blood, after being a Leper for 35 years (since RTA in very late 1986.

I started somewhere around there.
I’m now back to ‘the only person who will actually care is some poor bastard in extremis who needs a top up‘.

Megan
Megan
June 23, 2022 6:50 pm

And I am bloody indigenous. I was born in this country and am a proud Richmond woman.

Maybe not. My tribe is much more linked to the Merri Creek and North Fitzroy. All this country business is confusing.

And then there was the indigenous actress in the weekend lift out that said we will all benefit from learning indigenous languages. After all, she claimed, we all learn French when we go to France, non? She speaks seven but failed to explain exactly which of the 250 tribal ‘languages’ we should be forced to learn in order to be comfortably at home in the country we live in.

Dr Faustus
Dr Faustus
June 23, 2022 6:51 pm

Oops.
Accidentally reported Dr F at 5:48.

Luckily, you have no standi

John Sheldrick
June 23, 2022 6:52 pm

For Wilkinson, it looks like the worst she will face will be another grovel – which will be the third she has been required to make this month.

She has already apologised for making light of the war in Ukraine and for accusing former MP Andrew Laming of taking an inappropriate photograph of a woman.

For Lehrmann, justice now depends on jurors having poor memories.

How can Wilkinson ever be a witness for the Prosecution. What evidence does she have? Was she an actual witness to the alleged offence? Surely her “evidence” is only hearsay which is no evidence whatsoever.

calli
calli
June 23, 2022 6:53 pm

The Beloved used to be a regular blood donor. Always plenty to spare. 🙂

The blood truck was parked up at the shops, so he thought he’d pop in for a pint. No, no! You must make an appointment, said Blood Karen.

There was no one in there.

He hasn’t been back and probably never will again.

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
June 23, 2022 6:56 pm

it was a bundle of ridiculous virtuous word salad. With dressing.

Thanks Megan – I’ll be stealing that phrase.

Old Lefty
Old Lefty
June 23, 2022 6:58 pm

ABC fanning victim outrage because the Catholic Church didn’t make a fanfare of the death of a convicted pedo priest Vincent Ryan (who, please don’t misunderstand me, was a criminal scumbag of the first order):

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-06-23/fury-at-catholic-church-response-to-death-of-paedophile-priest/101176666

But where is the outrage that the ABC has never even reported on the conviction of its own serial pedo Jon Stephens, let alone mentioned his death, or the death of its Brisbane serial pedo Bill Hurrey?

feelthebern
feelthebern
June 23, 2022 6:59 pm

Just turned on Sky.
Some Aussies have donates an ambulance or two to Ukraine.
Hopefully they pop an apple tag on it somewhere so donors can ensure the things aren’t on-sold.

Ed Case
Ed Case
June 23, 2022 7:00 pm

How can Wilkinson ever be a witness for the Prosecution. What evidence does she have? Was she an actual witness to the alleged offence? Surely her “evidence” is only hearsay which is no evidence whatsoever.
Anything Brittany Higgins told Wilkinson would not be “hearsay”,
schmendrick.

Ed Case
Ed Case
June 23, 2022 7:03 pm

… or the death of its Brisbane serial pedo Bill Hurrey?

Bill Hurrey wasn’t a Pedophile, he was a convicted Pederast.
There’s quite a difference, so get your facts straight.

John Sheldrick
June 23, 2022 7:06 pm

I certainly won’t bother to donate blood, after being a Leper for 35 years (since RTA in very late 1986.

As I spent a year back in the UK during 1990/1991, then to date I have not been allowed to donate blood as per the Red Cross rules. I previously had donated blood. I may have carried the “Mad Cow Disease” from my UK residence during 1990/1991 . Mooooooooooo – No Way methinks.
These rules are now to be relaxed by the end of this year I do believe.

However, should I ever need a blood transfusion then I wish to have the blood donated by a person who has never been jabbed with these doses (Covid 19 drugs). Hmmmmmmmm. Now I wonder whether the Red Cross will ever differentiate between the blood donated by the jabbed and the “unjabbed”.

Entropy
Entropy
June 23, 2022 7:12 pm

Those vaccines are so genius you don’t have much to worry about. And a fair bit of field testing I observe.

John Sheldrick
June 23, 2022 7:12 pm

Bill Hurrey wasn’t a Pedophile, he was a convicted Pederast.
There’s quite a difference, so get your facts straight.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Pederast
p?d??-r?st?
noun
A man who has sexual relations, especially anal intercourse, with a boy.
One who is guilty of pederasty. Also pederist.
One guilty of pederasty; a sodomite.
The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
More at Wordnik

Sounds very sick to me.

Entropy
Entropy
June 23, 2022 7:13 pm

Genius=Tenuous.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
June 23, 2022 7:13 pm

How can Wilkinson ever be a witness for the Prosecution. What evidence does she have? Was she an actual witness to the alleged offence? Surely her “evidence” is only hearsay which is no evidence whatsoever.

It’s hearsay, but admissible under one of the exceptions to the rule*.

You can say in evidence that you had a conversation with someone about X, Y and Z – but a jury cannot draw any inference that the content of that conversation is true.

*From Blue Heelers, Season 4, Episode 1 ‘Sergeant Croydon Makes A Whoopsie’.

John Sheldrick
June 23, 2022 7:15 pm

Anything Brittany Higgins told Wilkinson would not be “hearsay”,
schmendrick.

Fair enough “Head Case”.

cohenite
June 23, 2022 7:20 pm

Anything Brittany Higgins told Wilkinson would not be “hearsay”

Unless it was a recent complaint, that is was contemporaneous with the alleged rape, anything Mrs pirate has is hearsay. And if it was a recent complaint it would only be evidence of consistency of the accusation not proof of the accusation.

feelthebern
feelthebern
June 23, 2022 7:25 pm

So Lisa Wilkinson does have standing.

John Sheldrick
June 23, 2022 7:25 pm

Settle down, there was never going to be any Trial.

Well Head Case, maybe the ACT Judiciary will now have the Case go ahead but without a Jury.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
June 23, 2022 7:25 pm

Most blokes – all right, some blokes – complain that their ladeeee other halves are expensive to maintain. Those blokes can STFU (the Hun):

A high profile barrister hired to represent Lisa Wilkinson after her Logies speech contributed to the delay of the trial of the man accused of raping former Liberal staffer Brittany Higgins could be costing up to $10,000 a day.

President of the Australian Bar Association Matthew Collins was hired to represent the Ten Network and Wilkinson hours after he appeared on the Seven Network’s Sunrise program saying it was a “serious possibility” authorities might charge the TV presenter with contempt of court.

$10 large, per day. Still liking that fat arse, Channel Ten?

2dogs
2dogs
June 23, 2022 7:36 pm

You can say in evidence that you had a conversation with someone about X, Y and Z

Only if such a statement is more probative than prejudicial.

What is it probative of?

Boambee John
Boambee John
June 23, 2022 7:44 pm

Ed Casesays:
June 23, 2022 at 6:26 pm
For Lehrmann, justice now depends on jurors having poor memories.

Settle down, there was never going to be any Trial.

Are you going to inform the judge? She seems to have a different opinion.

John Sheldrick
June 23, 2022 7:48 pm

Courtesy of Jo Nova Blog

The Ministry of Truth was quietly axed in the US after just three outrageous weeks.
The New York Post Editorial Board, May 18th

Nina Jankowicz just quit and the Disinformation Governance Board is dead. It’s the best possible ending to a move that was demented from the start.

Whatever the Department of Homeland Security thought the DGB would do, the board’s ham-handed launch (and very name) could only feed the direst suspicions. The US government has no business determining what’s “disinformation” — certainly not via an Orwellian shadow department, housed within a national security agency.

Celebrate the wins.

Boambee John
Boambee John
June 23, 2022 7:49 pm

Megansays:
June 23, 2022 at 6:50 pm
And I am bloody indigenous. I was born in this country and am a proud Richmond woman.

Maybe not. My tribe is much more linked to the Merri Creek and North Fitzroy. All this country business is confusing.

I am a proud Caucasian-Australian of the Irish, Dutch and Germanic peoples (with just a dash of Pommy).

Boambee John
Boambee John
June 23, 2022 7:53 pm

John Sheldrick

However, should I ever need a blood transfusion then I wish to have the blood donated by a person who has never been jabbed with these doses (Covid 19 drugs). Hmmmmmmmm. Now I wonder whether the Red Cross will ever differentiate between the blood donated by the jabbed and the “unjabbed”.

Perhaps you need to pre-donate, then store and receive back, your own blood? Is this possible?

Cassie of Sydney
June 23, 2022 7:54 pm

And here’s more of Mark Steyn from GB News, again just uploaded onto Youtube today, talking with a woman from Rotherham, she’s clearly working class, with a broad accent and she doesn’t mince words…..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXvlDvkO5NU

BTW…GB News is one of the few UK media organisations willing to talk about this.

John Sheldrick
June 23, 2022 8:09 pm

Boambee Johnsays:
June 23, 2022 at 7:53 pm

Perhaps you need to pre-donate, then store and receive back, your own blood? Is this possible?

Now there is a thought. If possible, I would probably need to do this on a regular basis as the donated blood has a shelf life. My very own Blood Bank……………..

Rockdoctor
Rockdoctor
June 23, 2022 8:11 pm

Fact 4. Those who have tried to speak up about the rape gangs, going back over a decade, are smeared as waaaacists , Islamophobes, white supremacists and neo-Nazis.

Cassie I know I have mentioned before. Family member who has lived in Europe and actually does now but not GB has a friend of Turkish ethnicity but born in Oz. The friend and I have met her is Muslim but secular, I had no idea till I was told. She also in some sort of social work as a profession. The friend was involved with the Rotherham victims when working in GB. She was so disgusted with the whole fiasco I was told she had to have a sojourn while the investigation went on. That I find galling.

rickw
rickw
June 23, 2022 8:18 pm

The Ministry of Truth was quietly axed in the US after just three outrageous weeks.

We see it as a win. They see it as part of a long term softening strategy that moves the Overton window.

cohenite
June 23, 2022 8:19 pm

NSW now 91% coal and gas. 9% cow farts and other wind sources.

Frank
Frank
June 23, 2022 8:36 pm

A new Beavis and Butt-head movie is out today. Tagline appears to be “on June 23 the world will get smarter” which is hard to argue with.

Colonel Crispin Berka
Colonel Crispin Berka
June 23, 2022 8:39 pm

ASIO became public knowledge, and at one stage opened their files to various wannabee activists and so on.

I’d like to do that one day, but it’s currently not possible for me.

They can’t open a file that’s still being appended to.

feelthebern
feelthebern
June 23, 2022 8:42 pm

The Ministry of Truth was quietly axed in the US after just three outrageous weeks.

No it hasn’t.
Just now just has been shuffled sideways & being run by a lower profile GWB deep state toadie.
Jimmy Dore put a video out on this a few weeks ago.

John Sheldrick
June 23, 2022 8:44 pm

Indolentsays:
June 23, 2022 at 8:36 pm
Already in the can?

ABC News Posts, Then Quickly Deletes an “Oddly Specific” Prediction For a HUGE Dem Victory in 2022

If the elections in November are fairly held, then the Dumb Dum Dems will likely get smashed. If the elections are not fairly held, then who knows. All IMHO.

GreyRanga
GreyRanga
June 23, 2022 8:47 pm

My dear departed mate had a hip replacement could realistically only give blood for himself as it was so rare. Another mate had a blood type about 15 characters long. Him and 6 other people donated regularly for themslves.

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
June 23, 2022 8:48 pm

Anyone able to post the piece by Chris Merrett in the Oz about the pirate’s missus?

Pleading at you ZK2A 🙂

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
June 23, 2022 8:52 pm

Anyone able to post the piece by Chris Merrett in the Oz about the pirate’s missus?

Posted up- thread – in full.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha says:
June 23, 2022 at 6:17 pm

From the Oz – I’ve posted the whole article.

After Lisa Wilkinson’s remarks about Brittany Higgins, can Bruce Lehrmann ever receive a fair trial?CHRIS MERRITT

Frank
Frank
June 23, 2022 8:55 pm

Here you go Barking Toad.

After Lisa Wilkinson’s remarks about Brittany Higgins, can Bruce Lehrmann ever receive a fair trial?

By now, Lisa Wilkinson must understand the truly catastrophic consequences of her ill-advised remarks about Brittany Higgins.

The real risk of a stretch in prison means she has no option but to surrender to Shane Drumgold, the ACT Director of Public Prosecutions, and provide every undertaking he has asked for – no matter how humiliating.

If all Drumgold is after is a promise that she will mend her ways and respect the presumption of innocence, it will amount to one of the greatest exercises of prosecutorial restraint.

This is the culmination of a regrettable period in which, to borrow a phrase from ACT Chief Justice Lucy McCallum, the boundary between allegations and proven facts has been obliterated by those who should know better.

This affair is far from finalised. But when Drumgold sought his undertakings, both sides would have known that formal legal proceedings over Wilkinson’s remarks could have had a very different result.

Those remarks cut across a pending jury trial by implicitly accepting the truth of allegations by Higgins.

READ MORE:Wilkinson, Ten offer court guarantee on trial comment|Wilkinson hires silk who slammed her speech|Wilkinson under fire, contempt risk after speech
Seven years inside – or a fine of $112,000 – is the maximum penalty under the Criminal Code of the ACT for recklessly publishing material that could cause a miscarriage of justice in a legal proceeding.

If that sounds harsh, consider the penalty for publishing material with the intention of causing a miscarriage of justice: ten years in prison or a fine of $160,000.

This helps explain why Wilkinson was well advised to hire Dr Matt Collins QC, one of the nation’s leading media lawyers, soon after he told a television audience on Wednesday there was a “serious possibility” the authorities might consider laying charges over her remarks about Higgins.

Based on what is already on the public record, and the adverse impact of her remarks on the trial of the man accused of raping Higgins, a tougher approach by Drumgold would have presented Collins with the challenge of a lifetime.

Proceedings under the Criminal Code could have come down to an argument over penalty: should Wilkinson go to prison – thereby ending her career – or merely be hit with a fine?

This woman’s fate is a second-order issue. The real problem is whether Bruce Lehrmann, the man charged with sexually assaulting Higgins in Parliament House, can ever receive a fair trial.

To ensure that happens, McCallum will need to overcome impediments that have been faced by few others.

She delayed the trial, hoping that the passage of time would ease the prejudicial impact of Wilkinson’s remarks on potential jurors.

Wilkinson, according to the Chief Justice, had “completely obliterated” the boundary between an allegation of rape and a proven fact.

What we are witnessing is not merely the fallout from one journalist’s brain snap. This is what happens when the presumption of innocence is discarded – not just by a handful of journalists, but by politicians who seem to believe this doctrine can be applied selectively.

If Wilkinson is in trouble for making statements that implicitly endorse the truth of the Higgins allegation – and that is what McCallum asserted – what are we to make of the conduct of others in public life?

In particular, what does this say about Scott Morrison’s apology to Higgins for “the terrible things that took place” in Parliament House?

At least the former prime minister tried later to walk this back by saying it was “by no means a reflection on the matters before the court”.

That was back in February, possibly too far back to influence a jury. But it was the same month in which the National Press Club provided a forum for Higgins and gave her a standing ovation. Was that another example of implicitly accepting the truth of her allegation?

If not, why was she there sharing a platform with Grace Tame, whose accusations of sexual assault have been tested and upheld in a court of law?

McCallum made the point on Tuesday there had been a “seamless elision” of the stories of the two women. They were not in the same category, the Chief Justice said.

Nobody should ever forget that former attorney-general Christian Porter was hounded from office on the basis of an unprovable accusation, which he denied, of sexual misconduct as a teenager with a woman who is now deceased.

It has subsequently emerged, in a book by Aaron Patrick, that one of those promoting that allegation had a youthful sexual relationship with Porter.

McCallum is duty-bound to ensure that Lehrmann receives a fair trial. But the government of the ACT has limited her options.

In May last year, before Lehrmann was committed for trial, this column warned that the intense publicity that had been given to the Higgins allegation made it essential for this case to be tried without a jury.

It is now too late to change the law to give McCallum the option of running this trial without a jury, which has long been a fallback in NSW.

Even now, a spokesman for ACT Attorney-General Shane Rattenbury says the territory is not considering judge-alone trials at this stage.

“But we will see if there are any particular lessons to learn from this high-profile case,” the spokesman says.

For Wilkinson, it looks like the worst she will face will be another grovel – which will be the third she has been required to make this month.

She has already apologised for making light of the war in Ukraine and for accusing former MP Andrew Laming of taking an inappropriate photograph of a woman.

For Lehrmann, justice now depends on jurors having poor memories.

Boambee John
Boambee John
June 23, 2022 8:55 pm

Toad

I think it has already been posted, perhaps on the previous page?

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
June 23, 2022 8:58 pm

Oops, thanks.

Must learn to pause when speed scrolling.

lotocoti
lotocoti
June 23, 2022 9:00 pm

Smart move running a Ukie appeal in a flic where the Russkis are the goodies, SBS.

Frank
Frank
June 23, 2022 9:06 pm

Apparently so must I.

feelthebern
feelthebern
June 23, 2022 9:07 pm

US positioning paper on effectively breaking up Russia.

https://niccolo.substack.com/p/delusion

Cassie of Sydney
June 23, 2022 9:09 pm

“For Lehrmann, justice now depends on jurors having poor memories.”

Australia 2022.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
June 23, 2022 9:17 pm

You can say in evidence that you had a conversation with someone about X, Y and Z

Only if such a statement is more probative than prejudicial.
What is it probative of?

That’s speculative, and dependent on what the conversation was actually about – not necessarily on what’s been reported.

That’s why this stuff is dealt with in pre-trial argument, if not a full blown voir dire. IF it’s allowed in, the jury is instructed to rah wah rah de rah, as per the Blue Heelers episode.

Zipster
Zipster
June 23, 2022 9:21 pm

Proceedings under the Criminal Code could have come down to an argument over penalty: should Wilkinson go to prison – thereby ending her career – or merely be hit with a fine?

lucy loves lisa, the wyminsis will stick together. lucy will get a kiss on the cheek and lisa a smack on the bum

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
June 23, 2022 9:24 pm

Proceedings under the Criminal Code could have come down to an argument over penalty: should Wilkinson go to prison – thereby ending her career – or merely be hit with a fine?

Seven years in tronk should teach the lady to keep her mouth shut..

Winston Smith
June 23, 2022 9:29 pm

Boambee John:

Perhaps you need to pre-donate, then store and receive back, your own blood? Is this possible?

Yes – we’ve been doing it for about 20 years.
Your body has 20% more red blood cells than it really needs, so if you are going to have a major scheduled op, it’s worthwhile considering giving up a couple of units beforehand. The other interesting part of predonation is that total blood volume is made up within a couple of hours, but not the blood cells. The remainder of the cells separate further and are more able to soak up O2 and release CO2.
This is what I’ll do next time I get pissed and fall over and breaking a femur. No spike proteins for Winston!

chrisl
chrisl
June 23, 2022 9:32 pm

It’s happening everywhere dept
40,000 Dutch farmers are protesting in central Netherlands (with tractors)
And why are they protesting?
The government says there is too much nitrogen being emitted and the farmers are to blame !
Yes really

calli
calli
June 23, 2022 9:39 pm

The government says there is too much nitrogen being emitted and the farmers are to blame !

For not growing enough crops?

Franx
Franx
June 23, 2022 9:41 pm

If Wilkinson is a worry, Morrison ought to be too.

Winston Smith
June 23, 2022 9:43 pm

Zipster:

This “rogue” ocean hacker says the solution to climate change is easy & cheap — so why are governments trying to stop him?

The world is currently in a low CO2 situation.
The planet isn’t warming and we need the CO2 up to about 0.8 to 1.2% to grow the food that we eat.
So pushing iron into the water to promote CO2 sequestration is going to be a disaster if it works.
As an aside, I doubt if we even know how much iron dust is being already flushed into the oceans of the world from rivers. I’d say his plan is needing a LOT more study.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
June 23, 2022 9:47 pm

WAtoday
Mining companies accused of corporate failure in shocking WA FIFO sexual harassment report
By Hamish Hastie
Updated June 23, 2022 — 1.03pmfirst published at 12.09pm

A West Australian parliamentary committee has urged the state’s resources sector to consider a register for perpetrators of serious sexual harassment on fly-in, fly-out sites similar to a working with children check.

It was one of 24 recommendations made by the parliamentary inquiry into sexual harassment against women in the mining industry, triggered after a spate of alleged sexual assaults on WA FIFO workers.

The committee, chaired by shadow health minister Libby Mettam, accused companies of “corporate failure” and criticised the regulator, the Department of Mines, Industry Regulation and Safety for inaction on the issue.

The findings were the result of months of testimony from victims, companies and DMIRS, that Mettam said revealed shocking failures to curb a deep-rooted problem in the sector that had destroyed lives.

“I was shocked and appalled well beyond expectation by the size and the depth of the problem,” Mettam said.

“The threats or loss of their livelihood that resulted was shattering and it’s completely inexcusable.

“It is simply shocking this could be taking place in the 21st century in one of the state’s most lucrative industries.

“This represents a failure of the industry to protect its workers and raises real questions about why the government was not better across this safety issue.”

The report found company statements of regret were sincere but rarely included accepting responsibility for allowing the situations to arise.

“All companies told us that staff safety was their highest priority. The level of sexual harassment in their companies indicates that this was not the case,” it said.

“The failure of companies to understand what was happening in their workplaces must be seen as a sign of corporate failure.

“It was clear that company processes were often ineffective; a more honest reading could suggest they were more focused on protecting companies and their reputations than serving the best interests of people who had been harassed.”

It also took aim at contract and labour hire practices rife through the industry which “diluted lines of responsibility” and created power imbalances between supervisors and employees seeking employment with the head business.

During the inquiry the committee heard horrific testimonies of women being demanded sex in return for favours as well as inappropriate touching and comments.

In one case a woman had a near-miss incident with a haul truck she was driving and told the committee the site supervisor said he would make the safety investigation “go away” if she had sex with him.

The same woman said she was told she would have to “get on her knees” if she wanted a permanent job with the mining company.

Another woman told the committee how she was knocked unconscious in her donga and awoke to find her jeans and underpants around her ankles.

Mettam said there was a raft of abhorrent stories that shocked the committee.

“There were stories of sex dolls put in front of women’s dongas, and sex toys hung on their
doors,” she said.

“Stories of unsolicited and unwelcome sexual attention, stalking, texting of explicit and lewd material, and horrifying stories of sexual assault.

“We heard details of unwanted touching, sexual comments, provocative photo requests and grooming.

“We heard of power-play behaviour known as ‘shovelling’ where iron ore would be dumped on the cab of trucks operated by women if they didn’t comply with sexual requests.”

Mettam thanked the women who came forward to lift the lid on the behaviour they had experienced.

The report extensive deficiencies in channels for reporting sexual harassment on mine sites both at companies and at the regulator, which it saved its most stinging criticism for.

“DMIRS reported that between 2015-2021 it received only 10 reports specifically relating to incidents of sexual harassment, while it received 22 reports of the more serious issue of sexual assault, 10 of which were in 2021,” it said.

“The committee is surprised that the key regulator of this enormous industry could appear to be satisfied that these figures represented a realistic picture of the problem.”

The recommendations include a raft of changes to reporting mechanisms, including reducing barriers to reporting and improving sharing of information while also respecting confidentiality.

A key recommended change was to establish an expert group within workplace watchdog WorkSafe WA with proper expertise to investigate, assess and deal with reports of sexual harassment and assault and related offences in the mining sector.

rickw
rickw
June 23, 2022 9:50 pm
rickw
rickw
June 23, 2022 9:52 pm

The threats or loss of their livelihood that resulted was shattering and it’s completely inexcusable.

It is simply shocking this could be taking place in the 21st century in one of the state’s most lucrative industries

Government vaccine mandates?

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
June 23, 2022 10:00 pm

A key recommended change was to establish an expert group within

Stop. There’s that word again.

with proper expertise to

Ahhhhhhhh.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
June 23, 2022 10:10 pm

Leave Lisa Wilkinson alone: Ten warns of defamation suit over Brittany Higgins row

Kristin Shorten
Investigative Journalist
3 minutes ago June 23, 2022

The Ten Network flagged potential defamation action against other media outlets on Thursday as star presenter Lisa Wilkinson was forced to give undertakings to an ACT court not to engage in further commentary about the Brittany Higgins case or the man accused of raping her.

As pressure grew on The Project co-host over her speech praising Ms Higgins just days before the trial of her allegations was due to start, Ten lashed the media’s treatment of its star.

Wilkinson has cancelled her Project appearances for the week. She was scheduled to front Thursday night’s program but Ten revealed just hours before it was to air that she would not be appearing.

She was to co-host on Friday and Sunday nights but those appearances have also been cancelled.

“Recent reporting on Lisa Wilkinson by some media organisations has been inaccurate and unfair,” the Ten statement read.

“There are significant facts that cannot be disclosed until after the trial has concluded.

“This reporting is now causing significant harm and we ask these organisations to cease this harassment to allow Lisa the best opportunity to give her evidence in court and to enable the trial to go ahead in a fair and timely manner.

“We are closely monitoring all coverage of this issue and Lisa and Network 10 reserve their rights in respect of any future defamation claims.

“Network 10 continues to fully support Lisa in her ongoing and full commitment to doing the right thing as a witness in the trial.”

Top Ender
Top Ender
June 23, 2022 10:21 pm

Rita Panahi: Lisa Wilkinson deserves to be charged with contempt of court after Logies speech

It takes a particularly noxious brand of self-delighted arsehattery to prejudice a rape trial for the sake of a Logies speech.

Lisa Wilkinson deserves to be charged with contempt of court for the reckless manner she has jeopardised Brittany Higgins’ rape trial.

The Project host’s conduct is all the more appalling given she received a warning just four days before the Logies from the ACT’s Director of Public Prosecutions Shane Drumgold about the risk of speaking publicly about the case.

Not that Wilkinson should’ve needed any warning, anyone who has been near a newsroom knows that once charges have been laid you cannot say or write anything that could prejudice a trial.

Wilkinson isn’t some inexperienced intern who didn’t know any better; she is a media veteran in her 60s well aware that her speech could undermine the accused, Bruce Lehrmann, receiving a fair trial.

Indeed on August 6, 2021 Wilkinson tweeted this warning to others: “On the issue of the 26yo man summonsed for an alleged sexual assault of a woman in Parliament House in March 2019 can I implore everyone to respect what’s in play here. Naming the man on social media & passing judgment could have dire consequences for the outcome of any trial.”

You don’t say, Lisa. But perhaps Wilkinson believes the law doesn’t apply to her.

ACT Supreme Court Chief Justice Lucy McCallum was damning in her comments on Tuesday as she “regrettably and with gritted teeth” vacated the rape trial which was set to begin this coming Monday but will now take place in early October.

Justice McCallum noted that the “distinction between an allegation and finding of guilt has been completely obliterated in the discussion”.

“The recent publicity does in my view change the landscape because of its immediacy, its intensity and its capacity to obliterate the important distinctions between an allegation that remains untested at law, and one that has been accepted by a jury giving a true verdict according to the evidence in accordance with the respective oaths or affirmations,” she said.

Lawyers acting for Wilkinson have assured the court that she will not publicly discuss the case again.

Talk about shutting the gate after the horse has bolted and fled to the next town.

On Thursday Justice McCallum was again scathing of the conduct that had seen a rape trial delayed by over three months.

“The publicity this week has focused sharply on the very fact that was being overlooked, which was that a man is facing trial for a serious offence, and he’s entitled to the presumption of innocence,” she said.

A number of legal experts have opined on the possibility of Wilkinson being charged with contempt of court including Australian Bar Association president Matthew Collins who called the Channel 10 presenter’s comments “ill-advised” and said it’s “certainly possible” that authorities would charge her.

“It’s certainly possible that the authorities will be looking at the speech that she made to the Logies and assessing that speech against the standard that applies in this branch of the law,” he said.

“That standard is, did anything that she did do have a tendency to interfere with the administration of justice?”

In a shock twist, some hours after making those critical comments, Collins was hired by Wilkinson and Ten.

The Network also made this bizarre statement through a spokeswoman: “Both Network 10 and Lisa Wilkinson take their legal obligations very seriously, including in the preparation and delivery of her speech given at the Logies event.”

Really? If that was the case we wouldn’t have a serious matter before the court derailed. A high school media studies student could’ve told Wilkinson, and the entire brains trust at Ten, that the speech was out of bounds.

This sorry episode must serve as a warning to others in the media who have also been irresponsible in discussing the allegations against Lehrmann who has pleaded not guilty to sexually assaulting Ms Higgins in 2019.

Every accused person deserves a fair trial and that is not possible if members of the media undermine the judicial process.

The interests of alleged victims are not served by prejudicing a trial.

Herald-Sun

Farmer Gez
Farmer Gez
June 23, 2022 10:30 pm

The Ten Network flagged potential defamation action against other media outlets on Thursday as star presenter Lisa Wilkinson was forced to give undertakings to an ACT court not to engage in further commentary about the Brittany Higgins case or the man accused of raping her.

Amazingly swift use of the victim card.
Absolutely bullshit and no one is buying this crap anymore except the ABC.

Cassie of Sydney
June 23, 2022 10:33 pm

““We are closely monitoring all coverage of this issue and Lisa and Network 10 reserve their rights in respect of any future defamation claims.”

Lisa the scab is feeling some heat and she doesn’t like it.

Dot
Dot
June 23, 2022 10:33 pm

The Ten Network flagged potential defamation action against other media outlets

Do it! Sue everyone with no basis! Channel 10 is so strong financially, they can definitely afford it! Also, a model litigant to boot!

I ferkin double dog derya.

Dot
Dot
June 23, 2022 10:34 pm

Come on Channel 10!

Complain about Justice McCallum!

Do it!

Cassie of Sydney
June 23, 2022 10:34 pm

The bottom line is that the whole case against the accused should be dropped.

Dot
Dot
June 23, 2022 10:38 pm

A West Australian parliamentary committee has urged the state’s resources sector to consider a register for perpetrators of serious sexual harassment on fly-in, fly-out sites similar to a working with children check.

Equivocation of sexual abuse of children with faux pas such as “leering” or asking out a love interest for a second time, is horrifically dumb and mentally putrid.

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
June 23, 2022 10:40 pm

Ch 10 threatening defamation proceedings against other media outlets for reporting on her skanky comments.

Go for it kiddies – lets see how that proceeds. The defamation defence of truth of what was said may just hit Ch 10 for 6.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
June 23, 2022 10:40 pm

It takes a particularly noxious brand of self-delighted arsehattery to prejudice a rape trial for the sake of a Logies speech.

Not a bad summary of the whole situation. Seven years up the creek should teach La Wilkinson that the sun doesn’t shine out her posterior orifice..

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
June 23, 2022 10:42 pm

Oh and she’s off the air for a few nights – stress leave?

Borrow the pirate’s hankie and cry me a river.

Dot
Dot
June 23, 2022 10:43 pm

Seven years inside – or a fine of $112,000 – is the maximum penalty under the Criminal Code of the ACT for recklessly publishing material that could cause a miscarriage of justice in a legal proceeding.

What we need now are brave but blatantly law disrespecting hackers to see if any handbag hitsquad chums planned this all along.

I really do wonder what their WhatsApp chats consist of. The schedule for more stocking fillers written by football living pirates?

Not that I condone any sort of illegal behaviour.

No ladies. You don’t go halves on a conspiracy charge. There is no timesharing for convicts.

Anyway, tick tock, tick tock.

Big_Nambas
Big_Nambas
June 23, 2022 10:45 pm

No I want this to go to trial, I am in awe of the prosecutor who has a victim that has “no memory” of anything that happened that night. can’t wait for this entertainment.

MatrixTransform
June 23, 2022 10:47 pm

I’d like to buy this bloke a beer

Energy reality bites hard

Dot
Dot
June 23, 2022 10:55 pm

I was at a dinner party in the 1970s in Canberra where a drunken ASIO officer got under the table and crawled around on all fours and barked like a dog.

Hey, the rest of us were drunk as well, but, really. There are limits

…not everyone is cut out for the SES band.

The other seven of you, condemned to APS6 and EL1 forever.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
June 23, 2022 10:55 pm

can’t wait for this entertainment.

I’m waiting for the security guards to give their evidence, and why La Higginz didn’t go to the cops?

MatrixTransform
June 23, 2022 11:03 pm

remember 2022 ?

… the year Putin turned off the Russian Solar Panels

Zyconoclast
Zyconoclast
June 23, 2022 11:07 pm

Cassie of Sydney says:
June 23, 2022 at 6:46 pm

*it should be noted that some Sikh and Hindu girls have been targeted in places like Luton but the Sikh and Hindu communities, given the history of Muslim r@pe in the Punjab, have been allowed to take took matters into their own hands.

I have made a slight edit.

Colonel Crispin Berka
Colonel Crispin Berka
June 23, 2022 11:18 pm

Calling Rex Anger,
Your new Bidentalk transliteration challenge
https://mobile.twitter.com/JamesMelville/status/1539581635154350081
go!

Bruce in WA
June 23, 2022 11:58 pm

Finally, weather forecast says a few days of fine weather ahead.

That’s great, because after the last few days I’ve grown gills, the jarrah supports for the patio have grown leaf buds, and the magpies and wagtails have been having backstroke championships across the front pool … errrr … lawn.

So I was thrilled to hear on the teev tonight the official report from the BOM that we are well on track for our driest June in 15 years!

FMD; are they taking their rain measurements indoors now?

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
June 24, 2022 12:09 am

BoM forecasters don’t look out the window Bruce in WA.

Observations may upset their models.

bespoke
bespoke
June 24, 2022 3:44 am

Cassie of Sydneysays:

June 23, 2022 at 10:34 pm

The bottom line is that the whole case against the accused should be dropped.

No. That is not justice. He will forever be a suspect if it doesn’t go a head.

Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:01 am
Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:02 am
Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:03 am
Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:04 am
Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:05 am

The same old muddle from David Rowe.

Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:06 am
Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:07 am
Ed Case
Ed Case
June 24, 2022 4:09 am

Every accused person deserves a fair trial and that is not possible if members of the media undermine the judicial process.

Oh yeah?
Ever heard of Chris Dawson and how The Australian ran it’s own Murder Trial against him for years?

The interests of alleged victims are not served by prejudicing a trial.

Why say “alleged victim” instead of “Justice”?
Aren’t you subtly trying to influence perceptions there?

Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:09 am
Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:10 am
Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:11 am
Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:12 am
Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:14 am
Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:15 am
Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:16 am
Tom
Tom
June 24, 2022 4:18 am
bespoke
bespoke
June 24, 2022 4:53 am
Top Ender
Top Ender
June 24, 2022 5:05 am

Adam Bandt unfurls banner of a radical culture war
JOHN CARROLL

Adam Bandt’s refusal to stand next to the national flag has provoked a wide and heated reaction, unsurprisingly.

The flag carries a lot of symbolic freight. It has waved overhead since Federation in 1901, watching over the nation’s history in its entirety. It has hung there throughout the ups and downs of the 20th century, and beyond, as a sentinel of national unity. Soldiers have died under it. Olympic medallists have stood proudly, often with tears in their eyes, as it has slowly been raised aloft to acknowledge their triumphs. It overlooks the national anthem to open football grand finals – in effect, giving official recognition to the event. It has been waved during royal visits. It emblazons Parliament House in Canberra.

In effect, the flag raises the hand of secular benediction over the nation, blessing it. It stands with the Constitution and the vast assembly of public institutions as the bedrock of society.

Protests such as those made by Bandt are to be expected of radical undergraduates in a surge of ill-thought revolutionary enthusiasm. During the Vietnam war years, American students burnt flags in deliberate acts of desecration, a crime in some countries. But a member of a significant and established political party, and indeed its leader, should be more circumspect.

The Bandt Luther moment – “Here I stand, I can do no other!” – signals that he regards Australia as illegitimate. He will agree to speak in public flanked by Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island flags, but not in the company of the national flag. For, as he puts it, it celebrates racist division.

If he truly believed in his own act, he should quit parliament. To remain is hypocritical. Parliament stands at the apex of institutions that make up the fabric of the nation. It stands equally as a condensation of the traditions, customs, and habits of civic life, with sources going back to first British settlement, and back behind that to the accumulation of legal and democratic wisdom developed across centuries in England. To cancel the flag is, at the symbolic level, to cancel federal parliament.

Behind this protest against the flag lies, in part, a change in patriotic expression that arose after the September 11, 2001, attack on the World Trade Centre twin towers in New York. Australians had always been understated in their nationalistic emotions, unlike Americans who have a long history of celebrating themselves as a chosen people, with a sacred constitution, a people who in their greater civic brashness enjoy flying flags in front of their homes.

Here, flags began to appear on cars on Australia Day and were politicised by some right-wing groups as during the Cronulla riots. I suspect a lot of uneasy feeling has arisen across the nation over the flag being put to such uses. It was somehow un-Australian, out of tune with the low-key national temper. Yet this new use of the flag – maybe abuse – is pretty trivial when set in the broader context of the flag’s unifying role across 120 years.

The issue is not that flags can’t be changed. The Australian national anthem is only 50 years old. Canada successfully introduced its vivid red maple leaf as its national symbol in 1965. Australia might have followed suit with the simple image of a flying kangaroo as its national emblem – much more striking and memorable than the somewhat cluttered Southern Cross and Union Jack. That moment has likely passed. And perhaps it is right that the nation goes about its business under an image of the starry heavens, rather than an animal totem.

Our flag as it is, invested with the entire substance of the nation’s history and memory, signals cohesion and togetherness. So, is the word treason too extreme in referring to a member of parliament who would tear it down?

I take my cue from Julien Benda’s powerfully influential book from 1927, La Trahison des clercs (The Treason of the Intellectuals). There is nothing new about radical culture warriors intent on undermining their own societies. George Orwell, himself a socialist, lamented at the end of World War II that the left intelligentsia in Britain would give a silent cheer whenever Adolf Hitler won a battle.

The Bandt moment might be passed off as just another example of the blindness to reality that pervades Greens politics. The party can mouth an absurd energy policy of no coal and no nuclear – which means, at this point, no base­load supply, in effect no electricity – because it will never form government. The shunning of the flag is different. The radical view of Australia being a cruel, mean, divisive and racist society, a view that has been percolating through schools and universities, is being taken into the political mainstream.

The truth about modern Australia, from any balanced sociological perspective, is that it leads the developed world in ticking off the buzz triple-box mantra of equality, diversity and inclusion.

Wealth inequality is low compared with other rich countries; even since 2001, income distribution has become marginally more equal. In terms of diversity, Australia has successfully assimilated migrants from hundreds of ethnic backgrounds and lang­uages since 1945. In terms of inclusion, Australia ranks high in intergenerational social mobility, unlike say the US; and the rapid expansion of non-Anglo surnames in an elite profession such as medicine indicates the porosity of the society.

That is the truth about the modern nation, which is not to deny the past racism of the White Australia policy or the larger stain of the dispossession of the first peoples.

Bandt may come to regret making so open and honest the ultimate goal of much radical politics. This week he wore his political heart on his sleeve. Hatred of nation will not go down well in the mainstream electorate. At the election last month the teals were successful at keeping the extent of their own radicalism undercover. Next time they may suffer from the naive frankness of the Greens’ leader.

John Carroll is professor emeritus of sociology at La Trobe University.

Oz. Bandt has successfully managed to paint himself into a corner on this one. On his next appearance does he a) not stand in front of the flag, therefore alienating Australians even more, and losing even more votes, or b) stand in front of it, thus selling himself out?

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