Sailboat at Le Petit-Gennevilliers, Claude Monet, 1874
Why am I left with the feeling that the parents of those demanding a “Free Palestine” were those chanting “One…
Open Thread – Weekend 28 Jan 2023
- Open Thread – Thurs 14 Nov 2024
- Open Thread – Remembrance Day 2024
- The Sweetest Victory
- Open Thread – Weekend 9 November 2024
- Open Thread – Thurs 7 Nov 2024
John Fund, a US columnist, being interviewed by Sharri is sporting a black eye. I wonder who socked him.
Fap, fap, fap. Cap’n, I canna give her anymore! If I do, she’ll BLOW!
WTF is going on with power in Qld? https://www.ergon.com.au/network/outages/outage-finder/outage-finder-map/ It looks like half the state is out. There’s 3 houses…
Myer Christmas window tradition cancelled over protest threatBy Cassandra MorganNovember 14, 2024 — 8.03pm Myer’s annual Christmas window unveiling has…
Made it to podium – aha!
I therefore claim this thread for the gallant men of HMAS Sydney!
Rightly so….
Il quarto.
Monet sailboat – beautiful
Rosie
We were there in Palermo about 4 years ago, and I ate what I thought was, without a doubt, the best meatloaf I’ve ever had. I can’t damn well recall the name of the place except for one thing. It was a few doors down ( on the same street) from where the famous prosecutor, who was car bombed, lived.
Surprised I’m around at this hour to stake a claim inside the top ten. Happy weekend to all!
I’m still celebrating Australia Day. I may keep this up for a while.
I’m with you there, Dr BG.
Tom is laboring away on the old thread.
Go there to look at the ‘toons.
Today I probably overdid the cultural experiences, while waiting for the mysterious majolica museum to open I walked up to what appeared to be a little garden which it was but also another 12th century basilica, della magione I think with a cloister, most notable for belonging to the confraternity of St George whose head was the bloke who got beaten by Garibaldi in 1848? so the order had all its substantial possessions confiscated, the oratory and cloister are definitely fixer uppers though the basilica which apparently incorporates a former mosque was repaired after being bombed in the war.
More of that wood grain paint.
The majolica museum is actually eight rooms of a private home on the piano noble floor of a palazzo. The owner started collecting majolica floor tiles from Sicily and Campania only when he was eleven I think that was forty three years ago, over 5000 in total dating from the 1490s to the 1930s when they stopped making them.
Guided tours only three a day at 4, 4.40 and 5.30 pm €10
Well worth it if majolica is your thing, or if you just like to look at beautiful objects.
the website
My apologies. I accidentally posted the January 28 cartoons on the old midweek thread.
We forgive you. Thanks agsin.
again
The Oz runs with Chalmers manifesto.
Odd.
I thought the they’d wait until after the NSW election to break cover with their policies.
They want enough margin in March to ensure at least two terms.
Thanks Tom! Here’s the story his cartoon is about.
Should HS2 be scaled back as costs soar? (27 Jan)
“A spending review means the £60 billion project might not travel into central London as costs climb in the wrong direction, according to reports.
The Euston terminus of the route may be delayed or even scrapped altogether as part of a plan to reduce the amount needed to complete the project, The Sun reports.
Passengers travelling on HS2 would be dropped off in the suburbs of west London and have to take the Underground to reach the heart of the city. The possibility of a scale back has also raised fears about the future of HS2 connections to Manchester and Crewe from Birmingham.
Concerns over the amount being spent on HS2 have been raised over a number of years. The Public Accounts Committee stated in 2021 that the estimated cost of completing High Speed 2 is between £72-98 billion (2019 prices), compared to an original budget of £55.7 billion in 2015 (2015 prices).”
Very Fast Train disease strikes again! With all the rubbish that engineering companies have to put up with in the green woke era it’s no surprise that these silly projects keep on faceplanting.
Maybe someone should let Albo know before he embarks on his own great white elephant.
According to the tail of the OOT, looks like 31 January’s Trump Day.
The picture wireless tells me that a radioactive container smaller than a 10 cent piece has been lost by somebody.
It’s apparently somewhere in the 1400km between Newman and Perth.
Sweet.
The picture wireless tells me that a radioactive container smaller than a 10 cent piece has been lost by somebody
Better have a lockdown.
It’s the only way to be sure.
I loved that Monet so much I re-worked it in embroidery and gave it, framed, to my sister in 1985.
A lovely thing.
The word “the” is racist.
And Then They Came For “The”: Associated Press Warns Use Of The Article Can Be “Dehumanizing” (28 Jan)
I suppose that would make new wave band The The doubly racist.
A quality discussion about Teddy Roosevelt.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWhMl6wqZw0
Did some horrible things but in my opinion was the last great US president.
Every one since oversaw the increase in concentration of business (especially FDR) that now enslaves the poor in the modern sense.
Zulu complains:
Ummmmm, you were too busy defending Winston Churchill on Australia Day?
By the way, MacArthur told General Wainwright to fight on.
Wainwright then told the other Generals that MacArthur had ordered a Surrender.
Harry S Truman presented Wainwright with the Medal Of Honor in 1946.
Govt project disease. Announcement ” we are going to build an X . It will cost $y.”
Goes out to tender, tenders all come in at $y +up to 50%.
There is nothing magical about a budget at the time of announcement. It is an initial guess when you have the least information. From experience managing IT projects, I mentally double the the price on any announcement.
Am I late to this RAND paper on getting out of Ukraine?
Is this the first war that they have not been onboard with?
Teddy Roosevelt was toxic waste.
Taft refused to allow a Third National Bank of the United States.
Proponents of The Bank funded Roosevelt’s Bull Moose Party, which split the Republican vote and allowed Wilson to win with 40% of the popular Vote.
Among other results of Roosevelt’s perfidy:
United States entry into WW1 at a time when Britain was considering Peace.
The Versailles Treaty, which continues to poison international relations in Europe.
I started relistening to the Drach’s US Flett problems last night. He started by reading an after action report that sounded like it could have been written after Midway, except it was written after the 1930 Fleet Problem.
The only eventuality they planned for/ enemy force tried, that didn’t happen, was planning for an attack by the Japanese on the Panama Canal.
It’s Teddy’s fault that Wilson won two elections, lied the US people about joining WWI & after winning the second time committed the US.
You know it makes sense.
Roosevelt was a flamerspook.
Obviously.
He lent himself to a successful conspiracy to force Taft out of the Presidency.
That opened the door to Wilson, who was beholden to players behind the scenes.
Teddy’s son, Kermit Roosevelt, CIA Point Man for the 1953 overthrow of Iran’s Mossadegh Government, was a Spook [and possible Flamer, since he was a mentor to James Jesus Angleton, a notorious Flamer].
Gore Vidal thought Teddy’s image was contrived and speculated that he was a Sissy, if not an actual Flamer.
Ba ha ha ha.
I knew it.
Diogenes I did a JV tender to the WA government in the 80’s. Something in the vicinity of $150 mil. The actual figure eludes me but what stuck was the fixed maintenance cost. $50 mil. pa. I couldn’t believe it. I thought I’d made a mistake. The government wanted to limit their liabilty. At the tender presentation our product was the only one working ready to go. An assembly plant to be built, we were the second lowest tender and should have got it. What did the WA INC go with, reinventing the wheel that never got off the ground 18 months later.
Of course, Teddy’s niece, Eleanor Roosevelt, was a Lezzo, and this stuff runs in families.
Ed is flameposting early today.
Ed did you ever hear about the gay satanic orgies at the Deakin Telephone Exchange?
Yes, Hang the Kaiser! A mostly peaceful election slogan.
Urgent health warning issued in Australia
Radioactive material, capable of causing acute sickness, has been lost in the west of the country
Authorities in Western Australia (WA) issued an emergency health alert on Friday, warning about a capsule emitting a “reasonable” amount of radiation that has been lost in the area. The WA chief health officer, Andy Robertson, urged people to stay away from the object if they find it.
“As a source, it emits both beta rays and gamma rays. So if you have contact or have it close to you, you could either end up with skin damage, including skin burns, over a period of time,” Robertson said, adding that “one of the long-term risks if exposed to a source like this is cancer.”
The capsule in question is a tiny object six millimeters long and eight millimeters high, or smaller than Australia’s ten-cent coin. It is believed to have fallen from a truck traveling on a 1,400-kilometer-long highway between a mine near the city of Newman and a depot in south-western city of Perth.
he capsule, which was reportedly lost on January 10, emits an amount of radiation equivalent to ten X-rays in an hour within a distance of 1 meter. That is roughly the amount of natural radiation a person is exposed to over the course of a year.
Authorities are urging all motorists who traveled along the highway after January 10 to check their tires in case the capsule is lodged in a tread. Australia’s Department of Fire and Emergency Services (DFES) said that the item cannot be weaponized, but recommended people to stay at least five meters away from anything that resembles the capsule and to immediately contact them.
“The capsule remains unfound,” DFES Country North chief superintendent David Gill said on Friday, adding that searching for such a tiny object in an area spanning over 1,400 kilometers does pose “challenges.”
Seems like if you just don’t get out of your car the radioactive pill thing will just break down and no longer be radioactive after a while?
If it is so small and potent it probably has a short half life?
New fred!
I open up The Oz and I see that Chalmers is doing to “remake capitalism”.
“Jim Chalmers is pledging greater government intervention to radically remake post-pandemic capitalism by redesigning energy, finance, labour, and social services markets — which he says are failing — while putting “fairness” at the centre of a plan Labor believes will deliver decades of national prosperity.”
New Zealand’s socialist nightmare under Saint Jacinda is, hopefully, soon to end (although the damage will last decades).
Australia’s nightmare, under Santo Albo, is just beginning. We have years of this, possibly decades.
By the way, anyone recall Sleazy with the gnashing teeth talking about “remaking capitalism” in the lead up to 21 May 2022. Nah, didn’t think so.
I used to read about countries like Chile, Argentina and Venezuela and think, thank God, I’m not living in such a country. Now I do.
US should ‘liberate Canada from Trudeau’ – Tucker Carlson
The Canadian prime minister leads an “authoritarian government,” the Fox News host declared
The US should send troops across its northern border to “liberate” Canada from under the yoke of Justin Trudeau, Fox News host Tucker Carlson has claimed on his daytime TV show. Trudeau, who ordered a draconian crackdown on anti-lockdown protesters last year, is letting his country “become Cuba,” Carlson added.
“I’m completely in favor of a Bay of Pigs operation to liberate that country,” he said on Thursday’s episode of ‘Tucker Carlson Today’, referring to the failed CIA-backed attempt to overthrow Cuba’s communist government in 1961.
“Why should we stand back and let our biggest trading partner, the country with which we share the longest border… why should we let it become Cuba?” Carlson continued. “Like, why don’t we liberate it?”
“We’re spending all this money to liberate Ukraine from the Russians, why are we not sending an armed force north to liberate Canada from Trudeau?” he asked, before laughing and saying that he had talked himself “into a frenzy.”
Carlson is noted for his deadpan humor, but the Fox host is also a fierce critic of Canada’s liberal leader. He slated Trudeau for introducing emergency powers last February enabling him to – among other things – seize the bank accounts of truckers protesting against his government’s hugely controversial vaccine mandate.
“Justin Trudeau is the dictator of Canada,” he said at the time. “If you think that’s an overstatement, try to think of another way to describe what Justin Trudeau is now doing.”
Carlson has also been a persistent critic of the Biden administration’s Ukraine policy – which has seen Washington spend more than $110 billion propping up Vladimir Zelensky’s economy and military with bailouts and progressively heavier armaments.
The conservative pundit has insisted that American money would be better spent fixing the US economy and border, and that Zelensky is attempting to drag the US into an open war with Russia
Well that’s a relief.
Investigator: how did you obtain that dangerous radioactive material?
Dr Evil: fell off the back of a truck, true story.
Ed did you ever hear about the gay satanic orgies at the Deakin Telephone Exchange?
Were you the guy in the GimpSuit, Dot?
Trump ‘not far away from truth’ on Ukraine – Kremlin
Former president is correct that the current US leader could swiftly settle the Moscow-Kiev conflict, Dmitry Peskov remarked
Former US President Donald Trump has basically nailed it by suggesting that the White House could put an end to the Ukraine conflict, Kremlin Press Secretary Dmitry Peskov said on Friday.
Hours earlier, Trump had claimed on his social media platform Truth Social that if he “were president, the Russia/Ukraine war would never have happened.” Even if it did and he were still US President, Trump “would be able to negotiate an end to this horrible and rapidly escalating war within 24 hours,” he argued.
Commenting on this remark at a media briefing, Peskov stated that Trump is “theoretically… not far away from the truth.”
“Indeed, should the US President wish to put an end to this conflict, he could do it very quickly, using the opportunity to simply give instructions to the Kiev regime,” the Kremlin spokesman said.
Such a result is impossible to achieve “overnight or in a couple of days, but in many respects the key to the Kiev regime resides in Washington’s hands,” he stressed.
However, Peskov continued, US President Joe Biden seems reluctant to embrace such a policy, opting instead for “pumping Ukraine with weapons even further.”
Earlier this week, the White House announced the decision to deliver 31 M1 Abrams tanks to Ukraine.
Russia has repeatedly stated that it is open to talks with Ukraine, but only if Ukraine “recognizes the reality on the ground,” including the new status of the regions of Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson, and Zaporozhye as parts of Russia.
Last week, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that while Moscow is “ready to respond to all serious proposals” regarding how to overcome the Ukraine crisis, it is “the West which decides for Ukraine” and it doesn’t give Kiev a chance to make any decisions on its own.
Welp
No, it is Cs 137.
Seems the real concern is if it was stolen. If it cannot be detected it’s likely no one will ever run across it on 1400 km stretch of road.
Bodycam Footage Shows Attack on Nancy Pelosi’s Husband
Very strange.
He’s the dumbest Federal Treasurer we have ever had. Honest to god Gillard would have been better.
National Emergency!
Thing the size of a 5 cent piece emits enough Gamma Rays to kill a person after 1 minute exposure.
Dot:
Nuclear Power Stations in everyone’s backyard now!
I’d be interested to see why that is being claimed. No, you’re not going to build a nuke out of one of those. If it is as bad as being claimed it has other potential uses. If a qualified person can authoritatively say it is impossible to weaponise at all then it would be far from pure Cs 137 and we could just not worry about it.
Conundrum in the US – five bleck cops charged with beating a bleck bloke to death.
Rodney King 2.0 incoming. Roof Koreans are standing by.
…and it can’t be weaponised? Some of the data we are being given is incorrect.
You have more radiation in your utilitarian basement Ed than most nuke med tech wukkas would be exposed to if they followed proper procedures.
In That’s the Way the Money Goes news:
Allegedly Arnold Bloch Leibler don’t come cheap – and the chances of costs covering young Sharaz’ fees are slight.
Surely Albo will be able to find a few dollars down the back of the National Sofa to support Team Brinny.
I remember reading they first wrote a paper were they promoted using Ukraine as a trap to weaken Russia. It seems having seen the course of the war in the last year has changed their mind. Paper and thread here.
Can anyone give me a rundown on some of the APS high flyers like Rebecca Falkingham? I can’t even find her age or quals. She just seems to float around politics. Baird and Andrews, now Shorten. Her “red wedding” sacking and rehiring was investigated by an ombudsman. She looks youngish but she’s been a “senior PS for 20 years”.
probably Cs137
Half life is 30 odd years.
Can’t they find it by driving along the roadside slowly with some Geiger counters ?
Jogging pace would have it knocked off in a week
Thousands expected. Preparations underway for Cardinal Pell’s Funeral.
Preparations have been underway for the last fortnight at the Cathedral for the event which is expected to draw the largest attendance the country has seen for the burial of any Catholic Church leader since the funeral of Melbourne Archbishop Daniel Mannix in 1963.
St Mary’s director of music Thomas Wilson said the music for the Mass has been selected with regard to Cardinal Pell’s support and encouragement of sacred music in Australia, and around the world.
“It includes the hymn ‘Firmly I believe and truly’, with its text by St John Henry Newman, which was chosen by Cardinal Pell for his Mass of Installation as Archbishop of Sydney in 2001,” Mr Wilson said.
“‘Love Divine, all loves excelling’ was chosen by His Eminence for the Opening of Domus Australia in Rome in 2011, attended by His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI, and it was also sung at the Archdiocesan Mass of Farewell for the Cardinal in 2014.”
The motet – a short piece of sacred choral music – was specially commissioned for the farewell of Australia’s best-known religious leader and churchman.
It’s a “good” idea if your forget such things as a balance of power and are alien to the cost and tragedy of wars.
No wonder Albanese told Reynolds not to attend the Mediation.
She blew her own career up and is thrashing round looking for someone to blame.
Liberal Party needs to do an intervention to save her from herself.
Or a nasty skin burn and a risk of cancer in 30 years time if you carry it around in your pocket.
Dot,
when they say ‘weaponised’ – they mean bomb.
If you took this thing and hid it in someone’s kitchen, so they were exposed constantly, they would die from cancer in a number of years.
If you ground it up and fed it to them – they’d die pretty quickly from cancer.
“All along, along
There were incidents and accidents
There were hints and allegations”
I have to ask how a radioactive source that small wasn’t in a larger, secure container.
I see Ed has run in and shat on the floor.
Okay.
Um?
Ed are you flameposting or spookposting now?
Rand Corporation – Avoiding a Long War -U.S. Policy and the Trajectory of the Russia-Ukraine Conflict – 32 Page PDF
How does this end?
Increasingly, this question is dominating discussion of the Russia-Ukraine war in Washington and other Western capitals.
Although successful Ukrainian counteroffensives in Kharkiv and Kherson in fall 2022 renewed optimism about Kyiv’s prospects on the battlefield, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s announcement on September 21 of a partial mobilization and annexation of four Ukrainian provinces was a stark reminder that this war is nowhere near a resolution. Fighting still rages across nearly 1,000 km of front lines.
Negotiations on ending the conf lict have been suspended since May. The trajectory and ultimate outcome of the war will, of course, be determined largely by the policies of Ukraine and Russia. But Kyiv and Moscow are not the only capitals with a stake in what happens. This war is the most significant interstate conflict in decades, and its evolution will have major consequences for the United States. It is appropriate to assess how this conflict may evolve, what alternative trajectories might mean for U.S. interests, and what Washington can do to promote a trajectory that best serves U.S. interests.
Key Dimensions That Define Alternative War Trajectories
Numerous analysts have posited scenarios for the war’s short-term trajectory—or even for endgames.
Although such scenarios are important constructs for thinking about the future, they are less helpful for determining what possible developments matter most to the United States. It is perhaps more useful for U.S. policymakers to consider which particular aspects of the conf lict’s future development will have the most significant impact on U.S. interests.
In lieu of rich, descriptive scenarios, we examine five key dimensions that define alternative war trajectories:
• possible Russian use of nuclear weapons
• possible escalation to a Russia-NATO conflict
• territorial control
• duration
• form of war termination.
Summary
Variation on all of these five dimensions—Russian nuclear use, NATO-Russia escalation, territorial control, duration, and form of war termination is possible at this stage in the conflict.
In the next section, we examine how the United States should prioritize among these dimensions as
it formulates its policy toward the war
Conclusion
The debate in Washington and other Western capitals over the future of the Russia-Ukraine war privileges the issue of territorial control. Hawkish voices argue for using increased military assistance to facilitate the Ukrainian military’s reconquest of the entirety of the country’s territory.Their opponents urge the United States to adopt the pre-February 2022 line of control as the objective, citing the escalation risks of pushing further.
Secretary of State Antony Blinken has stated that the goal of U.S. policy is to enable Ukraine “to take back territory that’s been seized from it since February 24.”
Our analysis suggests that this debate is too narrowly focused on one dimension of the war’s trajectory. Territorial control, although immensely important to Ukraine, is not the most important dimension of the war’s future for the United States. We conclude that, in addition to averting possible escalation to a Russia-NATO war or Russian nuclear use, avoiding a long war is also a higher priority for the United States than facilitating significantly more Ukrainian territorial control. Furthermore, the U.S. ability
to micromanage where the line is ultimately drawn is highly constrained since the U.S. military is not directly involved in the fighting. Enabling Ukraine’s territorial control is also far from the only instrument available to the United States to affect the trajectory of the war. We have highlighted several
other tools—potentially more potent ones—that Washington can use to steer the war toward a trajectory that better promotes U.S. interests. Whereas the United States cannot determine the territorial outcome of the war directly, it will have direct control over these policies.
President Biden has said that this war will end at the negotiating table.
But the administration has not yet made any moves to push the parties toward talks.
Although it is far from certain that a change in U.S. policy can spark negotiations, adopting one or more of the policies described in this Perspective could make talks more likely. We identify reasons why Russia and Ukraine may have mutual optimism about war and pessimism about peace. The literature on war termination suggests that such perceptions can lead to protracted conflict.
Therefore, we highlight four options the United States has for shifting these dynamics: clarifying its plans for future support to Ukraine, making commitments to Ukraine’s security, issuing assurances regarding the country’s neutrality, and setting conditions for sanctions relief for Russia.
A dramatic, overnight shift in U.S. policy is politically impossible—both domestically and with allies and would be unwise in any case. But developing these instruments now and socializing them with Ukraine and with U.S. allies might help catalyze the eventual start of a process that could bring this war to a negotiated end in a time frame that would serve U.S. interests.
The alternative is a long war that poses major challenges for the United States, Ukraine, and the rest of the world.
A quite extensive roundup of reactions to the Pfizer scandal still being ignored by the MSM.
Friday Funnies: Dr. Walker Exposes Pfizer’s Nefarious Research
I think we already knew that.
Majority of Antifa Members Exposed as being ‘White Children of Privilege’
‘Lab-grown meat’ harvested in ‘massive steel vats’ edges closer to fed approval & U.S. dinner plates – As EU approves human consumption of worms & crickets
and
You Say What? EU Puts Bug Additives in Food?
There was an excellent meme recently with the heading “Plant Based” over a picture of a gigantic concrete factory.
Elbow has described indigenous Voice nay sayers as “radicals.”
That they may be, but as with the “immature” comment about white opposition, his first resort is to slight opposition rather than engage with citizens who express their concerns.
It is devoutly to be wished that his premiership will be dashed on the rocks of this folly.
You bastard crotchless; you called someone else Mr Sulu. I’m Mr Sulu. What a fink you are.
Remember Morrison saying that everyone must be vaccinated and then equivocating but still saying that as far as possible they would ensure that everyone was vaccinated? I will never forget.
BREAKING: Secret Australian Government Reports prove COVID Vaccination has caused a shocking 5162% increase in Excess Deaths compared to the year 2020
From Indolent’s link.
Like all obsessions, it works on a few levels.
DrF, hammer man was probably invited otherwise ne wouldn’t have got into a gated community with the secret service outside. We have to see all the video available. Lovers tiff. Pelosi locked him out, man finds hammer in shed, breaks in and when he sees the cops he’s like FU Pelosi and hits him. The house would have had panic buttons all over. The secret service had to have known the cops were coming.
“Remember Morrison “
I prefer not to.
I’d rather not.
Who?
Here you go KD:
Charging Black Officers in Black Man’s Death is Racist (Daniel Greenfield, 27 Jan)
I’ve yet to work out if there’s anything, anything at all, which is not racist.
James Campbell in the Hun reports on the cost of beer going north at an alarming rate:
Australian beer drinkers will be hit with the second hefty tax increase in six months from Wednesday, with the brewing industry warning the price of a drink could soon hit $12.
The 3.7 per cent tax increase, which affects draught as well as packaged beer, comes on top of a 4 per cent increase in August.
The tax hikes, which are linked to inflation, mean beer drinkers are now paying $1.50 more tax per slab and almost 5 cents per schooner than they were in July last year. Almost $20 of the price of each slab and nearly 90 cents of every schooner is now going to Canberra
Australian beer taxes are now rising at the fastest rate in more than 30 years, to the fourth highest in the world.
The tax spike has led to the brewing industry calling on the federal government to follow the lead of their counterparts in the UK and Japan which have stepped in to slow beer tax increases.
It is also warning that a similar increase in six months’ time will see Australia overtake Japan to move into third place on the global beer tax table, behind Finland and Norway.
The increases appear to be having an impact on consumption, with Treasury in October forced to revise down how much beer tax it expected to collect by $30 million to $2.65 billion in this financial year.
In a letter to Treasurer Jim Chalmers, warning schooner will soon cost $12 in a club or pub, the Brewers Association of Australia, has asked the government to consider freezing the tax on beer sold in bottle shops for two years and halving the beer tax paid on tap beer in pubs and clubs in the May budget.
Brewers Association boss John Preston said an 8 per cent tax increase in the space of 6 months was “a huge blow” to everyone who enjoys a beer and the pubs and clubs which rely on beer sales.
“These are hidden tax increases which have been going up every six months for the past 20 years,” he said. “We believe that beer drinkers are now really beginning to notice when the price of their pint, pot, schooner or slab goes up due to yet another tax increase and venues are telling us that the record increases are making it more difficult to get people back through the door.
“People are already paying $8 a schooner in parts of Sydney – if this keeps rising like this it will be soon be surging past $12.”
He said Treasury’s own data now showed the tax increases were not delivering more revenue to the government: “They are just hurting beer drinkers and small businesses.”
The news of a price hike was about as popular as a warm beer among the drinkers at The Paddo.
“I think it’s pretty shit but what are we going to do about it, it’s like everything else going up,” retail worker Fionnuala McCarthy said.
“Am I happy about it? No … but everything has gone through the roof anyway.”
Article accompanied by a glum looking Chalmers and a beer swilling Albo. Shit is getting real!
Snap!
Elbow has described indigenous Voice nay sayers as “radicals.”
Presumably includes people like Price and Mundine?
That radioactive capsule fell out of the pocket of the subcontinental taking a dump through the hole in the floor. I suggest they look for it at the Hay truck stop and get truckies to check their thongs.
Please, someone snap them at the tennis quaffing champagne.
In Of Course noos:
A senior public servant who boasted about the success of the government’s bungled Hotel Quarantine program has been rewarded with a lucrative overseas posting.
Global Victoria CEO Gonul Serbest was central to a damning leaked video that celebrated the success of the quarantine system which led to the death of 801 Victorians.
Ms Serbest described the program as an “extremely rewarding project it had been to work on” and said she had “been thinking about this as one massive inbound super trade mission”.
On Friday Treasurer Tim Pallas announced Ms Serbest had been appointed Victoria’s new Commissioner for Europe.
She will be responsible for a new Paris office which will open next month.
Mr Pallas said the additional European presence would drive new opportunities and raise the profile of Victorian businesses.
Sectors including life sciences, technology, renewable energy and defence would be particular targets, he said.
“Our new office in Paris will increase Victoria’s presence in the vital European market, creating more opportunities for businesses and growing Victorian jobs,” Mr Pallas said.
“Victorian businesses are leaders in manufacturing and innovation, and our trade and investment network is helping to get their products in front of overseas buyers and investors.”
Mr Pallas said the office would also be working to attract new investment from Europe back into Victoria.
Invest Victoria chief Danni Jarrett will take over as the head of Global Victoria.
The new Paris presence will take the state’s Trade and Investment network to 24 offices around the globe.
FMD
Bruce of Newcastle says:
January 28, 2023 at 9:11 am
Conundrum in the US – five bleck cops charged with beating a bleck bloke to death.
Here you go KD:
Charging Black Officers in Black Man’s Death is Racist (Daniel Greenfield, 27 Jan)
If the five officers hadn’t been arrested and put on trial, it would be racist. Now that they are, it’s also racist.
I’ve yet to work out if there’s anything, anything at all, which is not racist.
The first rule of America is that everything is racist.
If you’re confused about this rule, you’re racist. If the sun rises in the morning, it’s racist. If it doesn’t rise in the morning, it’s also racist. If the earth turns out to be flat, it’s racist.
If a black man dies in police custody and nothing happens to the officers, it’s racist. If a black man dies in a confrontation with black police officers and they’re put on trial, it’s racist.
Specifically, those who demonstrated on Australia Day, BB.
My first middy in a pub was $1.70 and the schooner was $2.30. (I may be sundowning here).
Good luck getting much change out of $10 now.
I was deeply offended when fraught beers were more than $5.
Racism is the first resort of the scoundrel.
‘Elbow has described indigenous Voice nay sayers as “radicals.”
His description of “radical” isn’t a reference to Thorpe and her ilk. NO. He’s referring to people like you and me, and anyone who can’t see that has their head stuck in concrete.
Roger says:
January 28, 2023 at 9:15 am
Article accompanied by a glum looking Chalmers and a beer swilling Albo. Shit is getting real!
Please, someone snap them at the tennis quaffing champagne.
Not Champagne, but the ElbowSleazy Royal Wave to the Australian Peasants (Taxpayers)
https://www.gettyimages.com.au/detail/news-photo/australian-prime-minister-anthony-albanese-waves-next-to-us-news-photo/1246585314
Lefties rage about low rated, broad based consumption taxes; they are silent on exorbitant excise taxes on essentials (fuel) or very basic luxuries (cigarettes and beer).
They are elitist swill more concerned with protecting the tax free trusts of Hollywood actors and billionaire subsidy grifters.
Swill, absolute swill!
The wheels are falling off the Albo train, thanks to Ben Fordham, the Alice violence and Thursday’s Australia Day “invasion day” protests.
I remember when blokes would put a $5 or $10 note on the bar for their first pot and leave the change there; the bar maid would serve them again when they’d finished and take the price out of the change. After they’d exhausted their fund they’d be off and the bar maid would be left with what was left as a tip.
Is that Gillon McPolopony he’s sitting with?
Oh, and Ms. Kennedy…almost royalty!
Albanese clearly realises that he’s strapped to an electoral problem with the Voice.
If the Voice gets up at Referendum (my P50 case) it will likely be with a slim majority. Thereafter, when it becomes a very public running sore (my P99 case), it will be Uncle Luigi’s very own personal political albatross – with significant electoral consequences.
Hence angry demonisation of opponents rather than Rudd-style faux statespersonship. Better to cast opposition as hideously, structurally racist (or stupidly, unrealistically activist) right upfront – to buy political breathing space for the inevitable disappointment.
Tanya Plibersek is sharpening the big knife…
The supermarkets were on to the beer situation early, probably in light of the general cost of living upswing. Home brew product was expanding on the shelves throughout last year.
Director Pfizer clip now been seen over 30m X. Tucker Carlson gave it good coverage but mainstream media still ignoring story. Daily Mail did have an article but quicky deleted it.
Meanwhile a top safety official at FDA has resigned as he was not being informed about safety issues.
Roger says:
January 28, 2023 at 9:25 am
Not Champagne, but the ElbowSleazy Royal Wave to the Australian Peasants (Taxpayers)
Is that Gillon McPolopony he’s sitting with?
Looking at photo above – looks like him,but he has sure aged in ElbowSleazy Tennis Photo
Movie review time. ‘Women at War’. Eight part series on Netflix.
The series is set in the Vosges Mountains in August/September 1914, and revolves around a regional town, local industry and a local regiment preparing for battle.
Brilliant acting, directing, and a fantastic collection of vintage cars and trucks. Among the many big names are Audrey Fleurot (she of the ocean of red hair and terrifying stare) and Tcheky Karyo (the perpetual police inspector of French and Belgian series).
It is a dark and depressing voyage into anti-male, anti-church and anti-establishment tirades that could have been written by Louise Milligan.
All males (with one exception) are monsters. The priest is of course a rapist and covered for by the bishop, naturally. Violance, both physical and mental, against women is de rigueur. The women are all repressed victims of course.
It is a show that takes considerable resolution to move onto the next episode, but worth the journey if you are feeling suicidal.
The oldest constitution in the land? We are supposed to take this malarkey seriously?
The thing of course is Albo is desperately trying to give any details at all to the Voice proposal. So we have to pass it to find out what’s in it.
Unfortunately there’s quite a bit of suspicion of pollies out in voterland, so I think his gymnastics are being noticed. Bit of a problem: does he tell us what they intend, therefore causing another Republic referendum-style fiasco, or does he stay mum and have the Voice referendum fail because of his shiftyness?
feelthebernsays:
January 28, 2023 at 6:15 am
The Oz runs with Chalmers manifesto.
Odd.
I thought the they’d wait until after the NSW election to break cover with their policies.
They want enough margin in March to ensure at least two terms.
ftb, it’s a good way to get Albo, Alice Springs and da Voice off the front page.
Shows how worried they are about the referendum going down.
They’d rather spook the NSW election horses than have Albo grilled any further and having to say again “Sorry, I’m not sure what it is.”
https://youtu.be/vyK6gAb6Eao
Has his sidepiece done a Women’s Weekly fluff article yet, the one where she lets us all in on the real behind the scenes Albo.
Could someone put up Albrechtsen’s article from today Oz? thank you.
Seven Jews murdered outside a synagogue in Jerusalem, after Friday night Shabbat prayers.
According to a cockroach who comments here, the culprit must have “legitimate grievances”.
Presumably includes people like Price and Mundine?
No.
Price and Mundine’s cut through has been absolutely zero.
Specifically, those who demonstrated on Australia Day, BB.
Lidia Price needs to keep up the pressure and call a few Press Conferences.
If she won’t do that, then it’s looking like her opposition to the Yes Vote is solely designed to BlackWash the real opposition, and has Albanese’s paw prints all over it.
During the “lockdowns” Vic plod showed no hesitation using both weapons, pepper spray and, unnecessary, violence on those they deemed to be in breech of gummint “rules” yet last Thursday did, absolutely, nuttin’ when Lidia Thorpe brandishing a ‘weapon” harangued & incited violence to an assembled mob of protesters ….!
One set of laws for some and another set for the rest of us …
NEVER FORGET, NEVER FORGIVE …
Here you go…
PM’s voice amendment in breach of international law
JANET ALBRECHTSEN
Many readers will remember the MV Tampa, the declaration by then prime minister John Howard that “we will decide who comes to this country and the circumstances in which they come”, and the resulting claim that our immigration policies would make us an international pariah.
And yes, it’s true that many foreign politicians, Europeans in particular, made snide remarks about us. Until their own immigration problems reversed their views. Britain, for example, is now trying to implement our Pacific Solution in Rwanda. The pariah is now a role model.
The international pariah argument is now getting another run, this time in relation to the proposed voice. While Anthony Albanese was relatively restrained when he said recently that a No vote would be a “bad look”, other voice advocates are already in full-throttle smear mode.
The BBC’s Nick Bryant, for example, wrote in The Sydney Morning Herald before Christmas that “a Yes vote would help quash any lingering vestiges of the stereotype that Australia is a redneck nation. A No vote could be devastating and seen as proof the country is a racial rogue nation”.
Where is Owen Harries when you need him? One of Australia’s greatest intellects would have made mincemeat out of Bryant’s embrace of this foolish sacred cow about “world opinion”. As Harries wrote in 2002, “the truth is there is no such thing as ‘world opinion’. What we have is a variety of contending and shifting opinions, reflecting different values, interests and states of knowledge. To try to elevate one, or some combination, of these to the status of ‘world opinion’ simply represents an attempt to gain advantage on the cheap”.
Harries could have been speaking about Bryant’s fulminations today. They are not merely the kind of childish abuse the voice debate should be free from, but are also factually wrong.
A closer look at our international treaty obligations suggests that we might become an international law-breaker by inserting the Albanese Amendment into our Constitution, because it may well amount to a serious breach of our obligations under the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.
Australia is bound by that convention because we ratified it when parliament passed the Racial Discrimination Act in 1975 (unlike the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, which we voted against at the UN and have never ratified).
A constitutional voice will no doubt override any breach of the garden variety domestic Racial Discrimination Act. But compliance with domestic law does not relieve us of our continuing international-law obligation to comply with the convention. Insertion of the Albanese Amendment into the Constitution will, for the reasons set out below, violate the convention.
The convention defines the term “racial discrimination” as any “distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, colour, descent, or national or ethnic origin which has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life.” (Emphasis added)
State parties to the convention, including, of course, Australia, are required to prohibit and eliminate racial discrimination and are specifically required “to guarantee the right of everyone, without distinction as to race, colour, or national or ethnic origin, to equality before the law, notably in the enjoyment of the following rights: … (c) political rights, in particular the rights to participate in elections – to vote and to stand for election – on the basis of universal and equal suffrage, to take part in the government as well as in the conduct of public affairs at any level and to have equal access to public service.” (Emphasis added).
Unless a relevant exception applies, inserting the words of the Albanese Amendment into the Constitution would be an act of racial discrimination in breach of the convention because it would confer privileged access to political rights and public service on Indigenous Australians.
In the absence of a relevant exception, Australia would have a continuing obligation under the convention to “amend, rescind or nullify any laws and regulations” including the Albanese Amendment and any laws passed pursuant to it.
So, is there a relevant exception?
There is only one possible candidate for such an exception. The convention does provide that “special measures taken for the sole purpose of securing adequate advancement or certain racial or ethnic groups or individuals requiring such protection as may be necessary in order to ensure such groups or individuals equal enjoyment or exercise of human rights and fundamental freedoms shall not be deemed racial discrimination.”
But here is the proviso: “such measures must not, as a consequence, lead to the maintenance of separate rights for different racial groups and that they shall not be continued after the objectives for which they were taken have been achieved”.
This caveat is critical.
Our Racial Discrimination Act adopts all these terms and concepts, and in the leading case of Gerhardy v Brown in 1985, our High Court gave careful directions as to when a measure will fall within the “special measures” exception.
The case concerned a South Australian Act, the Pitjantjatjara Land Rights Act, which vested certain lands in the Pitjantjatjara peoples to the exclusion of all others (including other Indigenous groups). The court accepted that the act would have amounted to racial discrimination unless it could be brought within the “special measures” exception. Justice (later Chief Justice) Brennan set out four indicia of “special measures”. Relevantly, these included a “sole purpose” test and a “necessity” test.
The Australian Human Rights Commission has published guidelines on these tests which show there must be a degree of specificity about the precise aim of the measures and why the measures are necessary to achieve those aims.
Given that the federal government refuses to give any detail at all about how the voice will work, its specific aims or how it will achieve its aims, it is more than likely the Albanese Amendment would not meet the “sole purpose” or “necessity” tests of “special measures”.
But the killer blow for the Albanese Amendment is the requirement that “special measures” cannot continue permanently, but must be discontinued once the objectives for which they were established have been met.
In the Gerhardy, case the judges were clearly troubled that the relevant South Australian Act had, as Brennan noted, no sunset clause. However, the court accepted that, as Brennan said, the convention did not demand legislation have a specific sunset clause because once the circumstances justifying the special measure ceased to apply, the measure “would fall” because it breached the Racial Discrimination Act. Brennan quoted former chief justice Dixon’s comment that “if a power applies to authorise measures only to meet the facts, the measures cannot outlast the facts as an operative law”.
The problem for the voice then is that the government’s very reason for inserting it in the Constitution, namely to make it permanent, is exactly what the convention forbids, namely a permanent “special measure”. There is abundant evidence that the government’s purpose in inserting the voice in the Constitution, as opposed to merely legislating it, is to put it beyond repeal.
Indigenous Australians Minister Linda Burney stated the official government position in the Sun-Herald on January 22 when she said “by updating the Constitution to include the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander voice we will ensure that the voice cannot be abolished” by “future governments”.
While a legislated voice could clearly comply with the convention, a voice enshrined in the Constitution to give it permanence appears to be a pretty clear and obvious breach of the convention.
Ensuring the voice can be abolished by parliament is consistent with the treatment afforded to positive discrimination elsewhere. For example, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor said in the landmark US Supreme Court decision in Grutter v Bollinger, which approved limited and targeted use of racial preferences in US college admission processes, “race conscious admissions policies must be limited in time”.
It’s been a great pity, and a major mistake, then that the Prime Minister, who released the Albanese Amendment in July 2022, chose to outsource legal advice on these critical issues to a group of pro-voice enthusiasts. Had the Albanese government sought its legal advice from the Solicitor-General or more usual government sources, it might have found out that permanently entrenching racial preferences is not only a bad idea but will make us a genuine international pariah for breaking international law.
Stop thinking of it as ‘rising prices for goods’, think of it as ‘falling value of the dollar’, for that is the real cause.
Like all things, the laws of supply and demand apply to ‘money’ (the dollar is not money, but I digress) and the money supply has been growing exponentially for decades, and especially lately.
My favourite icecream in the 70s was 17c, now the *exact same item* is $3.50. Our wise masters have destroyed 95% of the dollars value in my lifetime.
Adam Bandt spotted in Carlton, diluting his soy latte with tears.
Getting in front of Dutton. Who should have been saying weeks ago “anyone opposing the Voice will be labelled as radicals by our Marxist Govt”
But he can’t, because the SFL’s are so far left themselves they are almost indistinguishable from Labor.
Ed Casesays:
January 28, 2023 at 8:09 am
Teddy’s son, Kermit Roosevelt, CIA Point Man for the 1953 overthrow of Iran’s Mossadegh Government,
An amazing achievement, considering that Kermit R died in 1943.
Word reaches my ears that, yes, the riots in Perth were an invasion day protest that went ballistic….
Gee. What a surprise. Labore dunderheads reverting to type.
The man is a moron who can barely string a sentence together, although the buck teeth and jug ears do lend it just the necessary amount of anti-gravitas.
The Oz article about Chalmers changing capitalism racking up the comments quickly as now over 1,000.
PS. Just in case people forgot. UK has dropped all boosters for under 50’s.
Can’t think why..
Every girls dream man;
https://substack.com/redirect/e320718f-986c-4e0e-95e9-f1b3ff7d048d?j=eyJ1IjoiaG85YmoifQ.bMnuNm5GLk5MFSCvcs0G5r0y-jYhpNwjaZVrL0QBwGM
Cassie of Sydneysays:
January 28, 2023 at 9:20 am
‘Elbow has described indigenous Voice nay sayers as “radicals.”
His description of “radical” isn’t a reference to Thorpe and her ilk. NO. He’s referring to people like you and me, and anyone who can’t see that has their head stuck in concrete.
Cassie, I thought what an enlightening juxtaposition.
The violent rhetoric of the Lidia Thorpe camp – with Albo muttering there are “various voices” and not all Aborigines will “take the same position.”
And his opinion of everyday Aussies who, because they are:
a) slightly distrustful
b) distrustful
c) wanting the details
d) slightly alarmed
e) alarmed
f) against
g) firmly against
…are all of the far-right.
#notallvoiceswillberecognised
Aaagh! .. the joys of communication wiv your kids .. LOL! .. My youngest msg me yesterday and said, “Having a coupla of your grandees for a sleepover this weekend .. want to take them to the Zoo?” ..
Soooo, I sez, “Yep, I’ll buy tix” .. then proceeded to purchase tix for Blacktown Zoo for Sunday .. informs daughter who sez , “Oh! no-oze! I meant Saturday, I’m working Sunday” ..
“Duuuh”, sez I, “You never mentioned that” ..
Back online only to discover you can’t change dates backwards, only forwards …… Duuuuuh, AGAIN!! ..
Fortunately, daughter rings them (I’m hopeless with phone calls, going deaf!) at opening time soooo no probs, time changed and it’s off to the zoo lunchtime .. haven’t seen these grandees since last Easter sooo an enjoyable afternoon coming up ..!
BEWARE happy snaps may be forthcoming …… LOL!
It’s possibly the most ambitious argument outside of Theodore J Rout (look it up) that the external affairs power overrides s 128 and the assumptions behind both the nationhood power & use of formerly royal prerogatives used by an indirectly elected PM.
Treaties have been ratified by Parliamentary legislation for centuries now, they’re not sealed by the honour of divinely appointed princes. Going back to the Tampa and Pape cases, I can’t see how this gets up given how French left his mark in supporting the executive’s power so strongly through those prerogatives and presumptions of sovereignty and representative democracy.
It is a precarious position. In theory I want this to be challenged and the case against it loses, then the referendum fails. I don’t want the High Court to go too far because our enumerated rights are so limited that many of our actual civil rights arise from these treaties.
The potential directions of the Ukraine War in spring 2023
Abstract
The Ukraine War slowed down over the past months due to the harsh weather conditions and the high casualties on both sides. Russia and Ukraine will likely launch new offensives between February and April 2023. While Russia’s battlefield destiny lies in its own hands, Ukraine still heavily relies on international support. Western countries are highly interested in this war as they perceive it as part of a broader resistance of the democratic order against authoritarianist aggression and the balance of power in Europe. The spring offensives will have a deceive impact on the course of this war. Russia waits until its new 150.000 soldiers finish training while Ukraine awaits further Western support.
The goals of both sides are irreconcilable, rendering a negotiated peace deal impossible at the moment.
So only a military defeat or political change in either one of the countries can bring an end to this conflict. Western countries have shown a high acceptance of new weapon supply thresholds throughout this conflict. Their willingness to cross new boundaries will also influence the outcome of this war.
1. Introduction
Ukraine has withheld Russian attacks for over ten months as of January 2023. Surprisingly, Ukrainian forces managed to reconquer over half of the territory it lost to Russia since the beginning of the invasion. However, approximately 20% of the country is still under Russian control (Zagorodnyuk, 2023). The strategic successes on the battlefield against an enemy superior in numbers have led several analysts to believe that Ukrainian forces might be able to liberate the rest of the country in the future (Ackerman, 2023). This paper outlines the potential directions this war will take in a decisive spring that will steer the further course of this conflict. It is safe to say that Ukraine’s battlefield successes heavily rely on the willingness of Western countries to continue their multibillion-dollar military and humanitarian assistance (Michaels, 2022).
2. Potential conflict directions in spring 2023
a. A shift towards Russian victory
Most importantly, Russia still has numerical superiority in airpower, artillery systems, and mobile armoured units. Their numbers are crucial for conducting large-scale military operations. Since October 2022, Russia has garrisoned more units in Belarus and will probably launch a second mobilisation effort at the beginning of 2023. The potential opening of a new front in the north forces Ukraine to divide its troops, weakening its capabilities to launch a successful offensive early in 2023 (Rudnik, 2022).
While Ukraine must fight for external military assistance, it is difficult to achieve significant breakthroughs against a newly growing and entrenched Russian force that will strike again when the time has come (Sly, 2023). Ukrainian territorial progresses also mean that Russian troops are increasingly concentrated and have an easier time defending their controlled territory due to the shortened front. Thus, it becomes increasingly difficult for Ukraine to make territorial progress.
Another crucial indicator is that Russia learns during the conflict, and its decision-making becomes more rational in certain aspects.
This behaviour is contrary to the strategic planning at the beginning of the war, which was a “disastrous miscalculation” (Goncharenko, 2022, para. 1). Instead, Russia’s strategy over the past months makes more sense from a military perspective. An exemption is the battle of Bakhmut, mainly fought by the Wagner Group. An example of the changing Russian behaviour is the shift to target Ukrainian infrastructure. This strategy maximises losses on the Ukrainian army and pressures it to focus on defence while minimising the casualties of Russian ground forces, sparing them, and waiting for fresh recruits to conduct offensive operations in the future (Hamilton, 2022).
The beginning of 2023 will undeniably have a decisive impact on the further course of the war. Russia will wait until the second half of its mobilisation effort is ready to join the fight. It is expectable that approximately 150.000 new Russian soldiers will finish their training in February. This rally means that a Russian offensive is expectable around February or March 2023, which is likely to occur around Bakhmut and perhaps another attack on Kyiv to divide Ukrainian troops (Moloney, 2022). At the same time, Russia will continue to attack Ukrainian infrastructure with relatively cheap means, such as drones, which are expensive to defend and further drain Western and Ukrainian resources. Russia’s main goal for 2023 is to fully control the four provinces Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhia, which it annexed in October 2022, while also attacking Kyiv again. This control would put Russia in a favourable position for future negotiations and calm the Russian population. The success or failure of this scenario depends on the efficient use of Russia’s newly trained soldiers and the Western support for Ukraine.
b. A shift towards Ukrainian victory
The successful Ukrainian defence over the past ten months and reconquest of lost territory gives enough reason to believe that the country can achieve further military successes in spring 2023. The professionalism and morale of Ukrainian troops, together with Western support, have led to some remarkable victories. Furthermore, the conflict has shown that most Ukrainians, whether soldiers or civilians are willing to give everything to protect their country. This determination has crucial implications for the continuation of the war as it lessens the impact of Russian attacks on Ukrainian infrastructure, aiming at reducing morale and war support. On the contrary, Ukrainians are even more willing to defend their country, and Russia will not win the war if it cannot conquer all of Ukraine (Kirby, 2022).
Even though Ukraine managed to destroy large amounts of Russian military equipment, it is undeniable that Ukraine lost a lot of its own equipment, which needs replacement to continue the war. According to Hooker (2022), the Ukrainian army needs support in mainly three categories: airpower, long-range artillery, and armoured mobility. Ukrainian forces are relatively successful in denying Russia air supremacy despite its smaller air force. However, Ukraine will need a strong air force to support offensive operations. The air support would reduce the losses of ground units while inflicting higher casualties on the Russian army. Secondly, Ukraine needs more long-range artillery to attack Russian supply routes and destroy logistic hubs or other high-value targets behind the front. These strikes would weaken Russian lines for future offensives. The reconquest of Kherson has already shown the strength of this tactic. Lastly, more armoured vehicles are needed to enable quick attacks, protect Ukrainian troops, and achieve local breakthroughs to throw back Russian troops to new defensive lines and push them out of the country. Without sufficient numbers of mobile armoured units, Ukraine must wage in a slower, more predictable, and trench-warfare style that is more costly and less effective (Hooker, 2022).
Figure 3 shows the most probable offensive option that Ukraine could launch in spring 2023. An offensive towards Berdiansk and Melitopol would cut off crucial Russian supply lines towards Crimea and put high pressure on the Russian military. However, Russia already anticipated this attack and prepared defensive lines to counter such an offensive at the end of 2022 (Dellanna, 2023). Generally, Ukraine’s army is much better at sustaining the harsh winter conditions than the Russian army due to its equipment. Therefore, it is likely that Ukraine will still launch this offensive in winter when the ground is frozen, enabling major troop manoeuvres. Furthermore, Ukrainian troops are better positioned equipment-wise for the winter than Russia’s (Dellanna, 2023). However, it would not be a surprise if Ukraine decides to attack a different front and only wants to force Russian troops to the south. Ukraine has already effectively done this in Kherson and Kharkiv (Khurshudyan et al., 2022). The second-best option for Ukraine would be to reinforce its attack between Svatove and Kremina to take control of the P66 Highway. For Russia, this street is the main supply line from Belgorod to Kremina in the Luhansk region. This offensive could force Russian troops around 40 kilometres back and would be another success in the liberation of Ukrainian territory in the east (Ministry of Defence, 2023).
The threshold debate is a balancing act between supplying Ukraine with the weapon systems it needs and an escalation of the conflict that could lead to a nuclear strike by Russia.
3. Western support in 2023
The high casualties on both sides and the challenging weather have shown that it is difficult for Russia and Ukraine to make any progress at the moment. Both countries prepare their troops for new offensives to get an advantage in the conflict. Russia waits until its new 150.000 soldiers finish their training in February, whereas Ukraine waits for more Western military equipment. Therefore, much of Ukraine’s success depends on Western support. The most crucial decision as of January 2023 has been more countries are willing to join the British government in providing modern tanks to Ukraine.
There are two main arguments against supplying Ukraine with Western tanks.
Firstly, the risk of further escalating the conflict, and secondly, the extensive supply system they require. For the former argument, Putin threatened several times that Russia adapts its full range of weapon systems based on international support. Consequently, Western countries were often hesitant about the types of weapons they sent to Ukraine (Davies, 2022).
However, analysts such as Hooker (2022) believe that, while the threat is real, it is unlikely that Russia will use nuclear weapons as long as there is no substantial threat to the existence of the Russian state.
For the second argument, critics stated that Ukraine is currently unable to maintain Western tanks. Therefore, it does not make sense to supply them at the moment. Sending the material, training the crews, and incorporating the units in Ukraine’s military will take a few months (Erlanger & Gibbons-Neff, 2023). Nonetheless, the Ukraine war has shown that Western countries are redefining their thresholds of weapon supply throughout the conflict. Thus, it should not come as a surprise if they send even fighter jets to Ukraine at some point. Despite the high costs for Ukraine’s allies, Dellanna (2023) argued that someone could make the cynical claim that the support is still a relatively low-cost solution for the West to face Russian aggression. Consequently, it is expectable that their support will only rise.
4. Implications of the conflict
The conflict can be interpreted as part of a broader struggle between authoritarianism and democracy. Other challenges of the current world order will analyse how far they can go based on the experience of the Ukraine War. One example is China and the growing tensions over Taiwan. Consequently, the current conflict will test to what extent the democratic order can resist these types of aggressions (Kirillova, 2023).
Overall, the Ukraine War manifests Russia’s objection to the entire post-1991 European settlement (Fukuyama, 2022). At the same time, Ukrainians have shown their willingness to defend their country as long as necessary.
These inherently different war goals render a negotiated peace deal unlikely as both sides have different sovereign war aims and do not accept each other’s territorial ideas.
Thus, it is more probable that a complete military success by either party over the adversary will decide the outcome of this conflict, at least until there is a political change in either one of these countries.
An amazing achievement, considering that Kermit R died in 1943.
Ha ha, sucked in.
Keep Google on Speed Dial, though, I’ll have more work for you shortly.
‘I will remake captialism: Jim Chalmers’
‘Jim Chalmers is pledging greater government intervention to radically remake post-pandemic capitalism by redesigning energy, finance, labour, and social services markets.’
God help us.
Indolentsays:
January 28, 2023 at 8:54 am
I think we already knew that.
Majority of Antifa Members Exposed as being ‘White Children of Privilege’
Married into the upper middle class?
My first middy in a pub was $1.70 and the schooner was $2.30. (I may be sundowning here). ….. Good luck getting much change out of $10 now.
Definitely, younger than me then .. 1967 .. middy 12cents, schooner 17cents .. public bar, Tatler Hotel, George Street, Sydney …….
The wheels are falling off the Albo train, thanks to Ben Fordham, the Alice violence and Thursday’s Australia Day “invasion day” protests.
The solution? More OPM!
Thanks, Roger. First LOL for the day.
I wondered how long it would take Luigi the Unbelievable (h/t to whoever coined that) to start blaming the Australian middle class for his failures.
Answer: eight months.
It’s not just us noticing “the wheels are falling off the Albo train”, Cassie.
Fun job for a Cat today: ask a taxi driver how he reckons Elbow is going. Please report back.
Never having a real job, in a real business, producing real wealth or real products, with no real contribution to national prosperity, with no real experience outside parasitic Govt/Union employ, one thing is absolutely certain here- he will REALLY fk up. And when he does and it becomes so self evident he can’t hide it, it will never be his fault. It will be the nasty capitalists who thwarted him.
“Fairness” – I smell lots of new taxes.
Remember, follow the money and you will find the truth (even if you don’t believe it when you do!)
Mainstream media continues to wade into the increasingly warming waters of an ocean turning against the COVID-19 vaccines. In an episode that surprised TrialSite, hosts of The Hill Rising point blank called the operation behind the COVID-19 vaccines a “grift”, as billionaires both influencing COVID-19 vaccination policy as well as investing in the underlying mRNA technology pushed heavily for the technology till it was mandated; and once it was apparent the strategy just wasn’t working as planned. Gates, for instance, sold some of his shares of BioNTech, the biotech developer of Pfizer’s BNT162b2 (Comirnaty) at a ten-fold increase in valuation—a return TrialSite was among the first to report on. Perhaps the most stunning takeaway from the recent Hill episode was snippets of Bill Gates’ talk at a recent Lowy Institute event in Australia, all but throwing in the towel on the current crop of mRNA vaccines. Why? The billionaire and global vaccine advocate was quite clear. First, the vaccines don’t effectively stop viral transmission (they are not sterilizing vaccines). Second, the mRNA vaccines are narrow in performance, not broad, in that with every seeming mutation the vaccines become less effective, and third, the vaccines exhibit questionable durability. The antibody inducing effects don’t last long enough for the people that need it the most, such as the elderly.
https://www.trialsitenews.com/a/follow-the-moneybill-gates-huge-returns-on-mrna-vax-financier-all-but-declares-current-covid-19-vaccines-doa-538ce8da
Getting in front of Dutton. Who should have been saying weeks ago “anyone opposing the Voice will be labelled as radicals by our Marxist Govt”
Doing that would just sound shrill and cause people to switch off.
Albanese is still stuck at the first hurdle, since he still hasn’t disclosed what’s in the Legislation.
Now, Albanese is the Government, it’s up to him to make the running on the Yes Case, not up to Peter Dutton to do it for him.
So far, Albanese has done a pretty good job of making the No Case.
Tanya Blathershit is remarkably quiet, biding time, not getting into trouble. Oh look, I didn’t agree with anything they did and as soon as you vote for me we’ll carryon just the same. Australian voters are so stupid. The World is in such a malaise of wokeness of munty type intellect it almost depresses me. None of them know how wealth is generated.
““Fairness” – I smell lots of new taxes.”
Wealth taxes and death taxes. It’s gonna be fun seeing and hearing the wails from the Teal voters in Wentworth, Warringah, Mackellar, Curtin, North Sydney, Kooyong and Goldstein.
Can’t you just see foreign investment flocking to take advantage of this wonderful, new economy?
Why does the attempt at a planned economy in Vietnam after 1975, and what a failure that was spring to mind?
Previous Dick Ed forecasts;
“Scommo will win by a country mile”
“Dan is dead in the water”
You’re just too obvious now. Better get a new sock from your Labor handlers dickhead.
When I read Chalmers comments I turned to my wife and said, FMD they have revealed their real agenda. These guys make Whitlam look like member of the right wing of politics.
If they go down this road they will be a one term government.
Dotsays:
January 28, 2023 at 9:22 am
Lefties rage about low rated, broad based consumption taxes; they are silent on exorbitant excise taxes on essentials (fuel) or very basic luxuries (cigarettes and beer).
They are elitist swill more concerned with protecting the tax free trusts of Hollywood actors and billionaire subsidy grifters.
Swill, absolute swill!
Wasn’t m0nty=fa bleating a day or so ago, about a Republican proposal to replace income taxes with a consumption tax? Something about a regressive tax on the poor.
I look forward to him pontificating on this news.
Sorry, who am I kidding?
My vision for a new values-based capitalism
Jim Chalmers
Federal treasurer
In late October, just before the Albanese government’s first budget, a journalist I’ve known for two decades messaged me a quote from one of the earliest Greek philosophers, Heraclitus: “No man ever steps in the same river twice. For it’s not the same river, and he’s not the same man.”
She knew I had worked on or responded to sixteen budgets in government and opposition, but she also knew delivering a first would be something much more new than familiar. Experience would matter, but hers was a neat reminder not to assume that what had worked in the past would necessarily work in the present
Heraclitus’s words are especially salient and resonant for these times, and for that budget. As we put it together, the global economy was beginning a third crisis in 15 years, one which will play out more substantially in 2023.
This latest crisis, of global inflation, has already begun to force the bluntest and fastest interest rate increases since the inflation-targeting era began, and this could cause recession in some of the economies that matter most to us.
In these pages 14 years ago, prime minister Kevin Rudd’s essay “The global financial crisis” was already wrestling with what to learn from that event of “truly seismic significance”. That essay was published on a Sunday – the first of February 2009. Less than a week later, Australia faced the full horror of the Black Saturday bushfires.
I see a dreadful symmetry between the global financial crisis and Black Saturday, in the way each overwhelmed our rational capacities to explain and grasp what was happening – not just our individual comprehension, but our collective understanding.
A royal commission was set up, and by December 2010, Victoria had a new bushfire safety policy framework, including changed fire danger ratings and evacuation warnings. The new advice learnt from that period has saved many lives since, including during the Black Summer fires of 2019-20.
But I see no mirror image in the longer-term international policy response to the economic and political crisis of 2008. Outside specific reforms to strengthen financial regulation, it is very hard to think of any similar set of changes in the way a budget is put together, and an economy is managed that truly reflects the lessons of that crisis, 15 years later.
So, for a decade before the pandemic, when most advanced economies had a terrible record, governments and independent authorities, backed by conservative prejudices and vested interests, still mostly stuck to a negative form of supply side economics. They pursued loosely defined goals for competitiveness through a race to the bottom on wages and public investment.
The “Washington Consensus” became shorthand to describe recommendations and orthodoxies for developing countries urged by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank – a reference to each institution’s proximity to the other in Washington, DC. Over time, it became a caricature for ever more simplistic and uniform policy prescriptions for “more market, not less”. This school of thought assumed that markets would typically self-correct before disaster struck.
It’s clear now that the problem wasn’t so much more markets as poorly designed ones.
Health of democracy
Democracies will prevail if we rely on their inbuilt strengths, and the ethical and practical incentives for leaders to govern in ways that improve the lives of the people. Our populations only become susceptible to the lies of populists and autocrats when democracies fail – it is in these circumstances that people reach for extremes, when they believe their system is already broken and their leaders have stopped listening.
The type of economy and the type of growth matters – and its distribution matters.
Social democrats always argued that sharing growth was right in itself – that economic inclusion is the measure of a decent society. In recent decades, economists have shown that inclusion is also a precondition for a robust economy, something that makes our economies stronger, not just something we can pay for when the economy is growing.
Now it’s time for democrats to understand that economic inclusion is fundamental to the health of democracies and the safety of nations.
Australia can do more and do better than just batten down the hatches in 2023 or hope for the best.
This relies on at least three objectives.
First, an orderly energy and climate transition, with implications for living costs, employment, where and how we live, the commercialisation of technology, and the trajectory of our economic development.
Second, a more resilient and adaptable economy in the face of climate, geopolitical and cyber risks, unreliable supply chains, and pressures on budgets from an ageing population.
Third, growth that puts equality and equal opportunity at the centre.
How do we build this more inclusive and resilient economy, increasingly powered by cleaner and cheaper energy? By strengthening our institutions and our capacity, with a focus on the intersection of prosperity and wellbeing, on evidence, on place and community, collaboration and co-operation. By reimagining and redesigning markets – seeking value and impact, strengthening safeguards and guardrails in areas of unchecked risk. And with co-ordination and co-investment: recognising that government, business, philanthropic and investor interests and objectives are increasingly aligned and intertwined.
With a new, values-based capitalism for Australia, we can understand something the old thinking neglected: that the problems of government – of whole societies – don’t and shouldn’t permit one simple solution set.
Renovate and renew
In the Treasury portfolio, a depoliticised and more regular Intergenerational Report will provide a clear sense of our long-term economic future, and a Tax Expenditure Statement will provide a more transparent, accessible analysis of budget pressures. This work will be supported by structures that will better evaluate what’s working and what isn’t. The Employment White Paper will plan for the highly skilled workforce that maximises the potential of our people.
We will renovate the Reserve Bank, responding to the RBA Review. And we will renew and revitalise the Productivity Commission as a powerful think tank advising government on productivity, as well as prosperity and progress more broadly.
It’s not just our economic institutions that need renewing and restructuring, but our markets as well.
“We can’t just retrofit old agendas or retrace the steps of our heroes to address them.”
— Jim Chalmers
Here, government has a leadership role to play. Defining priorities, challenges and missions – not ‘picking winners’. This is critical to guide how we design markets, facilitate flows of capital into priority areas and ultimately make progress on our collective problems and purpose.
The neoliberal model is the opposite of this. It pretends to be agnostic on these questions, but ultimately a choice is still being made through passive de-prioritisation and the perverse outcomes and greater vulnerability that emerge over time.
It’s not just our economic institutions that need renewing and restructuring, but the way our markets allocate and arrange capital as well.
Co-investment is a powerful tool at our disposal. The Clean Energy Finance Corporation has been a great success, partnering with investors to direct capital where it can have the greatest impact, not by subsidising returns but by helping structure investment vehicles in a rapidly emerging economic sector. We will employ this co-investment model in more areas of the economy, with programs already under way in the industry, housing and electricity sectors.
We want to change the dynamics of politics, towards a system where Australians and businesses are clear and active participants in shaping a better society.
This is what values-based capitalism can look like.
We can’t just retrofit old agendas or retrace the steps of our heroes to address them. We make our own new way across the river – rock-hopping and wading through the peril and polycrisis of 2023.
Talking to a SubCon Taxi Driver yesterday about Albo while doing a Butter Chicken run to the Indian Kitchen.
His response:
Albanese is a good man.
Labor are very good for the people, no?
Annastacia, she is good.
…the oldest constitution on the planet…
A copy is in a glass case in Parliament House.
Not written down but.
I can’t help thinking that if rioting and the breakdown of law are going to be allowed, that ordinary people need to step in.
Not to brass up the rioters, attractive though the idea might seem, but to pressure the politicians, courts, activists and media, such that they re-establish the rule of law.
Here’s another one, Tom…
Courtesy the ‘World Socialist’ web site of the Fouth International two weeks back:
‘Far-right premier of Australia’s largest state admits to having worn a Nazi uniform’
Imagine the world view in which Perrottet is “far-right”!
B_N I seen to recall there are a limited number of mrna proteins that can be used and using this particular one was not the thing to do when it was already known it didn’t work. I think it was 13 different proteins and now one is wasted. It can’t be used again. Somebody can correct me if I’m wrong.
With all that new OPM rolling out to the punters(all that “fairness”) they will be shoo-ins.
Fairness– the #1 demand of Millenials, their highest social and worklife priority. #2 demand – Green economy.
No surprises where we are headed.
Chalmers’ new economic blueprint
John Kehoe – Economics editor
Treasurer Jim Chalmers has unveiled a grand vision to revamp the nation’s long-standing market-based economic model, attacking “neoliberalism” and urging business to co-invest with government to deliver “values-based capitalism”.
Dr Chalmers criticised the free market economic ideology pursued by political conservatives and the “negative form of supply-side economics” prescribed by traditional economic institutions, including the International Monetary Fund and World Bank.
In a seminal 6000-word essay entitled “Capitalism after the Crises” due to be published by The Monthly on Monday, Dr Chalmers said markets were a positive and powerful tool, but had been poorly designed.
The philosophical assessment comes just weeks after the Albanese government’s intervention in the gas market to cap wholesale prices and the extension of multi-employer bargaining in workplaces.
It is in stark contrast to the economic approach of the successful Hawke-Keating Labor government, and provides a framework for the government’s thinking in a year when important decisions on budget spending and stage three tax cuts are expected.
Dr Chalmers said the nation was more vulnerable to economic uncertainty and upheaval after the 2008 global financial crisis, COVID-19 pandemic and the current energy price and inflation shock.
The Albanese government would “build a better capitalism” more aligned with Australian values and building more resilience against economic and geopolitical shocks, he said.
To build prosperity in the post-pandemic era, Dr Chalmers will seek business, investor and superannuation fund support to work more closely with the government on areas beyond clean energy and housing, to include the “social purpose” areas of aged care, education and disability.
“We will employ this co-investment model in more areas of the economy,” Dr Chalmers said.
“Collaboration is just as important as co-investment.
“The private sector is key and central to sustainable growth, and there’s a genuine appetite among so many forward-looking businesspeople and investors for something more aligned with their values, and our national goals.”
‘A race to the bottom’
Dr Chalmers said Labor was restoring and renovating democratic and economic institutions such as the Reserve Bank of Australia, which is under an independent review, and the Productivity Commission which Dr Chalmers has flagged likely changes to.
“Powerful economic interests” had a strong interest in keeping the existing economic system in place after the 2008 financial crisis exposed shortcomings when he was an adviser to then-treasurer Wayne Swan, Dr Chalmers said.
“The entrenched systems and institutions that dictate and drive public and private spending are so complex and vast, and powerful economic interests have so much at stake in keeping them in place,” Dr Chalmers said.
“So, for a decade before the pandemic, when most advanced economies had a terrible record, governments and independent authorities, backed by conservative prejudices and vested interests, still mostly stuck to a negative form of supply-side economics.
“They pursued loosely defined goals for competitiveness through a race to the bottom on wages and public investment.
“The ‘Washington Consensus’ became shorthand to describe recommendations and orthodoxies for developing countries urged by the International Monetary Fund and World Bank – a reference to each institution’s proximity to the other in Washington DC.
“Over time it became a caricature for ever more simplistic and uniform policy prescriptions for ‘more market, not less’.
“This school of thought assumed that markets would typically self-correct before disaster struck. It’s clear now that the problem wasn’t so much more markets as poorly designed ones.
“Carefully constructed markets are a positive and powerful tool.
“As the influential economist Mariana Mazzucato has explored in her work, markets built in partnership through the efforts of business, labour and government are still the best mechanism we have to efficiently and effectively direct resources.
“But these considered and efficient markets were not what the old model delivered.”
More inclusive and resilient economy
Dr Chalmers signalled the Albanese government would not replicate the same economic policies of the successful Hawke-Keating Labor government of the 1980s and 90s, which helped set up Australia’s prosperity by slashing tariffs, increasing flexibility in the labour market, floating the dollar, financial deregulation and a better social safety net.
“Our generation of policymakers and leaders faces different challenges too, and here we can’t just retrofit old agendas or retrace the steps of our heroes to address them,” Dr Chalmers wrote.
The Labor agenda so far includes the clean energy transition, investments in skills and training and recognising the centrality of wellbeing to economic success.
“How do we build this more inclusive and resilient economy, increasingly powered by cleaner and cheaper energy?
“By strengthening our institutions and our capacity, with a focus on the intersection of prosperity and wellbeing, on evidence, on place and community, on collaboration and cooperation.
“By reimagining and redesigning markets – seeking value and impact, strengthening safeguards and guardrails in areas of unchecked risk.
“And with coordination and co-investment – recognising that government, business, philanthropic and investor interests and objectives are increasingly aligned and intertwined.”
The essay comes 14 years after then-prime minister Kevin Rudd used the same magazine to admonish “free-market fundamentalism, extreme capitalism and excessive greed” exposed by the 2008 global financial crisis.
In 2012 Mr Swan as treasurer wrote in The Monthly about the “rising influence of vested interests in Australia”.
we are governed by perverts, megalomaniac lunatics and satanists
Mind how you go…you’ll likely be the one to be arrested.
The real shyte show would be if the GG refused to assent to a constitutional change on advice or not or a PM used the prerogative of the King to disallow a change up to one year later.
Note that s 59 refers to any law being disallowed.
how about removing the transfer payments incentivising ppl to sit on their ass
“Scommo will win by a country mile”
“Dan is dead in the water”
Country mile?
Dead in the water?
What are you, 103 years old?
Makka: you have a long history of shilling for Labor Governments.
Peter Dutton is the best Opposition Leader the Liberal Party have ever had.
Watch Question Time some time, he runs rings around Albanese.
To understand where we are headed, look at Canada. Same trajectory.
Analysis
Chalmers’ new economic model means more market intervention
Treasurer Jim Chalmers has pivoted from previous governments in his philosophy on the best economic model for Australia’s future.
John Kehoe – Economics editor
Treasurer Jim Chalmers has laid bare his philosophy to build a new economic model for Australia under the Albanese government.
Decoded, government will play a more active role in the economy, while co-opting business to help fund and implement Labor’s clean energy and progressive social agendas.
The policy details are so far vague beyond election commitments, but the direction of travel is made clear in his 6000-word essay for the progressive The Monthly magazine, “Capitalism after the Crises”.
Chalmers’ world economic view is borne out of perceived perpetual crises during his career in politics – the 2008 global financial meltdown, COVID-19 and now the energy and inflation shock.
The treasurer argues that going back to the “old” capitalist economic model won’t deliver prosperity for Australians after a decade of sluggish real wage growth.
Chalmers advocates targeted government intervention when markets are perceived to be failing.
He repudiates the economic orthodoxy of free markets and smaller government that has dominated policy thinking for much of the past 40 years, even taking a swipe at “entrenched” institutions such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund, while pledging to overhaul the Reserve Bank of Australia and Productivity Commission.
The Labor treasurer wants an economic system of co-operation between government and the private sector, through a shared embrace of what he calls “values-based capitalism”.
Facing a constrained budget, he urges business and investors – such as superannuation funds – to work with Labor to help fund the government’s policies on the clean energy transition, boosting affordable housing and the “social purpose” areas of aged care, education and disability.
Business will welcome his positive messaging, but be wary after Labor’s recent intervention in the energy market via price caps and union-friendly workplace laws expanding multi-employer bargaining.
Chalmers leaves open the door to interventions in other areas when markets are not delivering “fair” results for the community.
This is a major pivot in philosophy by Chalmers from recent Coalition governments under John Howard and, to some extent, the less market purist Morrison government.
Albanese-Chalmers won’t be a repeat of the bold economic-reforming and economically liberalising Hawke-Keating governments of the 1980s and 90s which helped set Australia up for 30 years of prosperity.
Chalmers says they are “heroes”, but today’s challenges and opportunities are different.
The economic belief system of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese and Chalmers is closer to Kevin Rudd, Julia Gillard and Wayne Swan, the treasurer who Chalmers advised for more than five years.
But there is less chaos and more order under the Albanese government.
Chalmers is politically savvy enough to be cordial with business and avoid public fights – even when there are differences of opinion on policies like energy and workplace relations.
In The Monthly 14 years ago after the financial crisis, Rudd blatantly attacked the “greed” of capitalism.
It fell largely flat in aspirational Australia, which avoided the worst of the banking crisis in the northern hemisphere.
Chalmers is more mild-mannered in his critique, saying the problem isn’t necessarily markets, but more “poorly designed” markets requiring government fixes.
The sensitive political issue of tax is barely touched on, after Chalmers last year floated winding back the stage three personal income tax cuts.
Yet, there is enough of a hint about “budget pressures” to suggest tax breaks will come under scrutiny ahead of the May budget to help pay for Labor’s social spending priorities.
Chalmers notes that Treasury will publish a more “transparent” tax expenditure statement, which annually reports the cost of individual tax concessions.
Chalmers’ essay will enrage economic rationalists who championed the prosperity driven by the market model adopted by Thatcher, Reagan, Howard and, largely, Hawke-Keating.
But the new approach will be popular with the supporter base of the modern Labor Party.
Nevertheless, the essay does not detail how this Labor government will grow the economic pie through faster productivity to redistribute the social gains to society like Hawke and Keating did.
Delivering prosperity will be the true test for “values-based capitalism”.
Bons, I started reading that and thought, Yay! Finally something worth watching on Netflix.
Then I read on….
Makka, Canada with beaches and sunshine all year long.
We might just be okay.
Word which will haunt him as coal fired power stations close ahead of schedule.
Albanese is basically pleading for Dutton to Oppose the Referendum, so he can start the Smear Campaign.
It’s all he’s got left.
Of course, he can’t abandon the Referendum or it’s the Rudd/2010 scenario all over again.
Hence his Labor Shills excoriating Dutton for not having a backbone.
Hands up who here thinks the Teal voters of Wentworth, Warringah, Mackellar, Curtin, North Sydney, Kooyong and Goldstein care about “fairness”.
LOL.
Of course Trump is POTUS. You wouldn’t get this if he wasn’t
All being done legally, as it was foretold.
And these aren’t scoops
They’re forced confessions. Confess and have your legacy preserved or something far, far worse. Buckle up, lots more to come. Each worse than the previous one.
Trudeau to go on 7 Feb.
Ed, you’re fortunate you’re paid for the qty of your pro-Labor posts . You’d starve if you were paid for quality. Or accuracy.
Madam you forget yourself. Just watch Sharpe, Ma’am. These Netflix producers are ill bred and ignorant SCUM OF THE EARTH! They’re probably French ragamuffins too.
Imagine the joy of being the Prince Regent and seeing Major Sharpe’s surprise appearance eh? Look Sharpe? Eh? Eh you say? It’s a good joke ain’t it Ma’am!?
PS
He should have married either the dowager Countess of Kiely or Camoynes.
“for quality. Or accuracy.”
or decency.
Ed Case and Homer Paxton:
Jim Chalmers has the runaway popularity of a Mack Truck!
Da Klimate “belief” level has become a very good means of deciding where someone fits on the idiot scale.
Perhaps more South Africa.
A republic of racial divisions, street violence, blackouts & gated communities where the liberal well to do are protected by armed guards.
Well it will be “fairness” that costs other people, not them. That’s okay.
Tom, I was going to use “Leo Wanker” at first, then Luigi came to mind, especially with his distraction squirrels of “Dansa Maria, dance!”.
Chalmers can be Leo. I want to watch him do the ute drag.
Chalmers and runaway inflation. A metaphor.
Test
No.
Chalmers’ essay will enrage anyone who champions prosperity, economic mobility and a stable society.
calli,
Oh Canada…..
“Federal carbon price increase
On April 1, the federal carbon tax will increase to $65 a tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent, from $50 a tonne in 2022. The price is set to rise by $15 a tonne annually for an eventual target of $170 a tonne in 2030.
The increase means consumers will pay 14.3 cents a litre of gasoline in fuel charges in 2023, about 3.3 cents higher than last year. Heating oil – upon which large swaths of Atlantic Canadians rely to warm their homes – will cost an extra 4 cents a litre in 2023 compared with last year.”
Putin isn’t Russia’s worst military leader… yet.
Upticking your own comments now, Makka?
Rubio Sends Letter to Pfizer CEO on Alleged Gain-of-Function Research
Lol, dick Ed. Upticks? Really? Stop projecting.
That’s not what you want to hear from Wayne Goosesteen’s brains trust.
Pfizer director admits they MUTATE and ENHANCE viruses!
One for Lady with Strata Problems – Apologies Old Age Brain Freeze on name
Why strata waterproof repairs may be costing you more
When the building commissioner came gunning for cowboys, some good guys were caught in the “not OK” corral.
Apartment living can be a minefield of unintended consequences. And it often sees battles in which neither of two diametrically opposed forces are wrong.
One current bone of contention is between independent waterproofing contractors and the NSW Department of Customer Service (Fair Trading) over the Design and Building Practitioners(DBP) Act, which came into force last year.
The intent was to drive cowboys out of the building industry. The idea was to require them to have architects or engineers approve their work in advance.
One key battleground is waterproofing, one of the most common defects in apartment blocks and particularly significant as water leaks and seepage can be devastating on adjacent homes or in an entire block.
The act gives government agencies sweeping powers to investigate and prosecute building professionals who breach the new laws on design and certification, and can lead to everything from stop-work orders to hefty fines.
The unintended consequence of this welcome clean-up of the building trade has been that some small, independent and reliable builders are being forced out too.
It’s not just builders who are complaining. Owners corporations have discovered that the costs of relatively simple jobs have soared, largely because the services of another paid professional are required to get the work approved.
One remediation builder with more than 40 years’ experience has contacted Flat Chat to announce that he’s had enough and is taking early retirement.
He has just told five hitherto happy clients that he could no longer work on their blocks as he would be breaking the law. He could study for an appropriate certificate but the time, money and energy required just aren’t worth it.
“I am a licensed builder and a licensed waterproofing technician with 40-plus years’ experience – just the sort of person these poor owners need,” he told Flat Chat. “But I can’t do this any more.
“We would have to get an engineer or architect (who generally do not have anywhere like my knowledge) to certify my solutions. I doubt anyone will be interested in doing this and it just adds more to the cost for the owners.”
He said excluding appropriate waterproofing professionals from the provisions of the act would resolve the issue overnight. But NSW Building Commissioner David Chandler and his team are in no mood to backtrack.
“We are not proposing to create a class of design practitioner for waterproofing,” Angus Abadee, director of building and construction policy at the Department of Customer Service told Flat Chat.
“Our key concern is that there is not an appropriate qualification that waterproofers hold that teaches design.”
Abadee agrees there is a clear gap in the current market, with a shortage of appropriately qualified professionals, and says there is work underway to develop a waterproofing certificate that includes design.
“Waterproofing is the building element that most frequently is defective in our audits of work,” he says. “Forcing practitioners to go through the rigours of the DBP scheme is seen as critical to address this worrying trend that is compromising purchaser’s confidence in the quality of apartments in NSW.”
Where does that leave apartment owners? There is no doubt that works are suffering delays and costs are being inflated.
But perhaps that’s the price we have to pay for making sure everyone gets the best quality work – not just the lucky few whose builder has all the nous and experience you could wish for, but only lacks a rubber stamp.
You can read the waterproofer’s point of view online on Flat Chat and there’s a thorough breakdown of the law on Fair Trading’s website.
Chalmers is indeed a dangerous, ignorant clown, but he is fully supported by a Marxist Treasury that has waited decades for his arrival.
Decades in which lazy Liberal Governments oversaw the radicalisation of the PS, and enthusiastically supported interventionist repression.
It is telling that Mr PhD in politics didn’t believe it necessary to reveal his program during the election campaign – “phht why would we”?
We will be bankrupted, our kids are believers, our grandkids fully indoctrinated. It will be up to the great grandkids to fight for the restoration of freedom.
It’s min, OldOzzie. Victoria, where building codes go to die.
War is really expensive.
Senator Ron Johnson on Thursday called for Congress to investigate Covid vaccine manufacturers in response to Project Veritas’ undercover video exposing Pfizer’s alleged plans to ‘mutate’ the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
calli says:
January 28, 2023 at 10:40 am
It’s min, OldOzzie. Victoria, where building codes go to die.
Thansk Calli, I hasd started typing min, but then thought not sure
https://www.flatchat.com.au/?s=victoria site may be of use to min
Ed Casesays:
January 28, 2023 at 9:58 am
An amazing achievement, considering that Kermit R died in 1943.
Ha ha, sucked in.
Keep Google on Speed Dial, though, I’ll have more work for you shortly.
Error, no, Richard Cranium. You referred to the son of Teddy. He died in 1943. His son, Teddy’s grandson, was the CIA man.
I wasn’t sucked in, you sucked yourself off.
He’s part of a government that won around 32% of the primary vote!
We need Abbott to get back in his old job of opposition leader and then fire him the moment they win.
Has anyone seen Mater around on the webs? He’s missed.
duncanm:
ANSTO should have a gamma-sensitive camera for tasks like this, which could be side-mounted on a truck if it is too heavy to put on a drone flight.
If they don’t have one, call Pine Gap. They know people who know people, y’know?
That is indeed suspicious. So an alternative explanation for this story is that there is no lost radionuclide, the story is a psyop to remind aussies about the threat of nuclear war.
What, it’s just random co-incidence that you’ve never heard of an incident like this in your lifetime (I haven’t) and it has happened the same week Australia is sending more fighting vehicles to escalate war in Ukraine? It’s not impossible, the militaries do things like this occasionally.
What I’d like to know is the real original purpose of this radioactive sliver. Seems overpowered for a smoke detector. As it came from a mining site, my guess is that it is (supposed to be) part of some kind of slurry density meter that uses a known radioactive source on the opposite side of the pipe to the meter to measure absorption by the slurry in between and estimate density, so that (in conjunction with an ultrasonic flow meter) a mass flow rate can be estimated by the distributed control system.
Just checked SBS and they added:
It’s a re-run of “The front fell off”.
Re the new Chalmers screed, Cats should be rejoicing the death of neoliberalism. But no, of course, it’s shrieking partisan frightbattery all the way.
GreyRanga
The World is in such a malaise of wokeness of munty type intellect it almost depresses me. None of them know how wealth is generated.
Marry it? Inherit it?
To put it mildly.
OldOzzie on Jim trainer wheels Chalmers. “not picking winners”. What a joke, “how we design markets”, choke splutter! All we do is give subsidies to donors and the market sorts itself out. Union superannuation funds invest and get us re-elected. Simples.
Marxist mOron, cheering for the creeps and freaks. Taking your kid to the tranny library session today, mOron?
Having lived in Canada for 15 years I have some knowledge on this matter. The close resemblance of the indigenous of both countries is very real, both love sit down money and grog. The Canadian Indians are way ahead in the reparation/treaty stakes. They are way ahead in the amount of tax money they receive for nothing.
Canada is certainly NOT a model we should follow.
Groogs doing his usual Saturday morning impression of a 3yo poking his poo with a stick. Did Mother not give you enough attention?
What is the chance that Damar Hamlin’s injury was caused by the vaccine? 100%!
Sopranos star John Ventimiglia’s daughter Odele dead at 25: Family is ‘heartbroken’ by her passing just three months after she gave birth to a baby girl
Cassie of Sydneysays:
January 28, 2023 at 10:25 am
Hands up who here thinks the Teal voters of Wentworth, Warringah, Mackellar, Curtin, North Sydney, Kooyong and Goldstein care about “fairness”.
They probably do in a theoretical sense, but only until they feel the impact personally.
Someone has dropped a fart in the WALieboral Tarago. Never ones to let failure stand in their way.
What we learned from the old thread:-
.1 The Cat is off the pace;
.2 Granita is an anytime food and potentially a main course;
.3 This is a Big Website with Bigger Predictions;
.4 Indian shopkeepers will talk about the “crazy big-spending Aussie farmer” for generations.
Surely that should go to Richard Marles, who inspired a laugh from me this morning.
Regional Australia ‘has never had a better friend’ than Anthony Albanese (27 Jan)
Made me crack up. That he can say something as breathtaking as this with a straight face just shows what Labor is like.
A gated community on “Millionaires Row” just out of Capetown. World class shopping and dining on the “Waterfront” in Capetown, restricted entry. Beats the crap out of Fremantle.
Man wearing helmet headbutts a dude extremely hard in the chest, dude dies of sudden heart failure, later revived.
Cooker morons: “it was the vaxx!!11!1!!1one”
I have been pondering a Venn diagram of two groups of people:
Those who criticised government labelling absolutely everyone that croaked it with Covid as a Covid death;
And those that insist anyone that dies an indeterminant time after the jab died because if the jab.
While the second group is a lot, lot smaller, I suspect the overlap is quite considerable. The thing is those in the intersection are very aware of the obvious beam in the views of government, while completely blind to the equally large beam in their own eyes.
You could even whack in the absolute lunar level nut jobs linking 5G cell services to a virus infection as a third field, but thankfully they are such a tiny group right in the middle of the intersection of the fields they thankfully aren’t worth getting hot under the collar about.
Somewhere in a Hawthorn basement a man is shrieking in terror that people have too many civil rights, aren’t regulated enough and aren’t paying enough taxes.