Open Thread – Weekend 29 April 2023


Road along the Loing Canal, Camille Pissaro, 1902

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Rockdoctor
Rockdoctor
May 1, 2023 5:18 pm

Greenwich vs Latham.

Popcorn please. Latho knows where plenty of bodies are buried and hasn’t been shy to threaten ALP powerbrokers like Richo in the past. IMO a grubby little man like man like Greenwich (Clovers lackey) wouldn’t be devoid of controversy so this has potential to get very interesting.

calli
calli
May 1, 2023 5:19 pm

Father a chiropractor, mum worked at Jantzen. Bother. Divorced. Zzzzzzz.

Ahaha! Christian Scientist!

Gotcha!

Steve trickler
Steve trickler
May 1, 2023 5:21 pm

Knuckle Draggersays:
May 1, 2023 at 5:06 pm

Go get your booster!

thefrollickingmole
thefrollickingmole
May 1, 2023 5:23 pm

You cannot run with ‘Oh, you know, but he’s 30% or 50% or 70% right’ – as was suggested by quite a few here on a particular subject only two years ago

Part of the problem being peoples longing for a Armageddon instead of a catastrophe,.
Plus there is a genuine, 100%, industry in governments and corporations seeding the most outlandish stuff to discredit the rest.

Eg: WA firearms laws are being redone because the police/pollies deliberately colluded and “blew up” and lied about a gun dealers “bunker full of WeAPons!!!!” and how some technical illegalities might have been occurring..

Followed by the story disappearing except to be mentioned as an example of why laws need to be more restrictive.
There actually are deliberate propaganda and bullshit campaigns from state and non state actors.

rosie
rosie
May 1, 2023 5:23 pm

Another observation.
Picked up grandchild from daycare last week where they were celebrating Aboriginal Anzac day.
Absolutely nothing against our Aboriginal brothers and sisters in uniform but how about a bit of inclusivity?
Next year I’m going to suggest to his parents they offer a display of my grandchildren’s gg grandfather, recipient of a Distinguished Conduct Medal in WWI and a whispering man.

Muddy
Muddy
May 1, 2023 5:24 pm

the globalist elite have already murdered one billion people

The question that needs to be asked is ‘How and where do you dispose of that many bodies?’
That’s a lot of extra brickettes [speling?] for the crematoria.

Muddy
Muddy
May 1, 2023 5:26 pm

… Not to mention the extra work on Clean Up Australia Day.

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
May 1, 2023 5:27 pm

She must be mainlining stem cells.

May be closer to the truth than you think. It’s a common enough cosmetic practice to have a small amount of your blood drawn, centrifuged to remove the red blood cells, and the remaining plasma reinjected via small injection pricks into your facial skin, which encourages further collagen production. I have had it done twice, some years ago now, at a fairly moderate cost. It worked well for me, but not for my friend, so it’s fairly idiosyncratic. This technique is also used now to relieve various inflammatory episodes in knees, hips, and body organs. Anywhere, in fact. Doing it too much however, as with all things cosmetic or in medical treatment, is not helpful.

This treatment is getting more experimental when foetal stem cells taken from donated placentas are also introduced into the plasma. These can be purchased and used medically. Probably cosmetically if you care to investigate and pay a lot for it, but I don’t. I won’t inject foreign cells into my body. I probably have enough foreign cells lingering from four pregnancies, as we now know they do.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
May 1, 2023 5:32 pm

We just had a month of global homo hoedown sponsored by the government and a lot of mainstream businesses.

Passed a Ncl bus today with a huge display on one side of rainbows, with Pride Ride blazoned across them. Decided I’d avoid government buses.
Not sure I’d like a Pride Ride, sounds disgusting.
Btw has Mr Greenwich had his monkeypox vaccination yet?

rosie
rosie
May 1, 2023 5:32 pm

Having read about Mr Zonfrillo’s long term addiction to heroin and his mental health issues including what must have been severe anxiety he mentioned in a New Idea article in 2020, coupled with the requested welfare check, I’m inclined to a most likely cause of death being non vax related.

H B Bear
H B Bear
May 1, 2023 5:33 pm

Greenwich vs Latham

I noted we were overdue for a Sydney celebrity trial. And let still no subscribers.

Rockdoctor
Rockdoctor
May 1, 2023 5:33 pm

Do NOT look that up on Urban Dictionary.

I looked. Wow is that even possible???

Lysander
Lysander
May 1, 2023 5:39 pm

Part of the problem being peoples longing for a Armageddon

A mate of mine (who also happens to be a priest) said to me on the weekend “you know, people say there’s only two certain things in life: Death and taxes.”

“But,” he continued “Christians only believe that taxes are certain as there will be a Second Coming and some won’t die.”

Lysander
Lysander
May 1, 2023 5:41 pm

Having read about Mr Zonfrillo’s long term addiction to heroin and his mental health issues

And to think we live in a world where you can dial up a doc and get a script for euthanasia over the phone (but naughty citizen… don’t dare try to buy two boxes of panadol!!!)

Tom
Tom
May 1, 2023 5:41 pm

Having read about Mr Zonfrillo’s long term addiction to heroin and his mental health issues including what must have been severe anxiety he mentioned in a New Idea article in 2020, coupled with the requested welfare check, I’m inclined to a most likely cause of death being non vax related.

In other words, it was a suicide.

Why wasn’t that in today news stories?

The Australian news media is now an extension of the government and sees its job as keeping readers in the dark about stuff they’re interested in.

Carpe Jugulum
Carpe Jugulum
May 1, 2023 5:41 pm

Replace Nazi with pineapple on pizza.

But only a Nazi would have pineapple on pizza

thefrollickingmole
thefrollickingmole
May 1, 2023 5:52 pm

But only a Nazi would have pineapple on pizza

Pepperoni Carpe, Pepperoni..

Also the latest in Grampians caravan park apparel.

OldOzzie
OldOzzie
May 1, 2023 5:53 pm

Carpe Jugulum says:
May 1, 2023 at 5:41 pm

Replace Nazi with pineapple on pizza.

But only a Nazi would have pineapple on pizza

Bit Broad in the Spectrum there Carpe Jugulum

Ham & Pineapple Pizza beloved by Wife, Daughters & Grandkids, and none of them even lean slightly Nazi

Myself,

defined by Family as Right Of Genghis Khan – MeatLovers Supreme Pizza with Tomato Base

Speedbox
May 1, 2023 5:54 pm

DrBeauGan says:
May 1, 2023 at 12:54 pm
If I were Taiwanese, I’d be awfully worried about being supported by Joe Biden. I’d look at the Ukraine and wonder if Joe would be fighting China to the last Taiwanese.

If you were Taiwanese I suggest that you would already be making regular deposits into an overseas bank account……. just in case. Somewhere not too far away, modern, democratic……. like……oh I don’t know…… Australia perhaps. Reasonable size Taiwanese community here, some occasional hassles with the Chinese community, but not too bad.

Taiwan is half the size of Tasmania compared to Ukraine which is almost the size of NSW. Fighting to the last Taiwanese takes on new possibilities for a huge death toll given the small land area and the relative sophistication of Taiwan’s military and pre-existing weapons will necessarily draw a sharp and vicious Chinese assault. Failure is not an option for China, or more particularly, Xi. His Chairmanship of the Party, political legacy and home prestige is at stake.

Even so, the Chinese have some big issues. China cannot ‘broadcast’ its intentions. One (often mentioned) option will be to undertake ‘war games’ being the excuse for dozens of warships, hundreds of planes, missile batteries and 500,000 troops massed on the Chinese shore. This will have to be practised a couple of times to iron out any bugs because when the real thing happens, the assault must be all over in a 2-3 days and Taiwan subdued.

Despite all the obvious diplomatic protests from the West and threats of Taiwan support, sanctions etc, it will take the Western powers several days or more to mount any spirited defence of Taiwan and China will want to avoid direct USA-China military confrontation. The Chinese won’t shy away if that happens, but better a fait accompli with their land forces in situ.

China might withdraw their ships to their mainland bases meaning that if the Western forces want to dislodge Chinese forces, they have to come ashore into Taiwan and not just target floating Chinese assets. Easier said than done against a defending Chinese force with (almost) endless air support from the mainland -vs- US carrier operations.

If there is a direct confrontation, I wonder how far the Americans will push it and what their risk/loss appetite will be? If the Americans are not willing to take on Russia (directly) then they sure as Hell won’t want to take on China. How will the American public react? All in or, ‘meh, not our fight’.

Personally, I think the Taiwanese Foreign Minister is being very optimistic in suggesting a 2027 date. I reckon the next 18 months is more likely with Western armaments at historic low levels (despite some ramp up in production now underway) and, could the West maintain support of Ukraine whilst also taking on China over Taiwan?

Nobody wants any of this to happen but as somebody on the Cat pointed out recently, all this war talk has eerie parallels with how many Europeans must have felt in the late 1930s.

Cassie of Sydney
May 1, 2023 5:55 pm

“In other words, it was a suicide.”

That’s what I thought too.

Frank
Frank
May 1, 2023 5:56 pm

You wouldn’t say there was much dignity in the Office of PM after Waffleworth and SloMo had finished. And even so, Albo manages to diminish it.

Hard to beat Gillard and her clownish beard in the vinyl bomber jacket.

bespoke
bespoke
May 1, 2023 5:57 pm

It’s not pizza without pineapple.

Tintarella di Luna
Tintarella di Luna
May 1, 2023 5:58 pm

In Europe, possibly to prevent employee theft, a lot of cafe bakery businesses that accept cash have cash processing machines that means there is zero cash handling by staff.
Have never seen one here.

I saw one the other day for the first time at the ZamZam supermarket in Auburn.

OldOzzie
OldOzzie
May 1, 2023 6:00 pm

The Fed Failed but Wants More Power

As expected, Michael Barr blames Congress and his predecessor for Silicon Valley Bank’s failure.

By The WSJ Editorial Board

An iron law of the modern administrative state is that the solution to regulatory failure is always to give regulators more power. (Note post on NDIS above)

That’s the key to understanding Federal Reserve Vice Chair for Supervision Michael Barr’s autopsy, released Friday, of Silicon Valley Bank’s (SVB) failure

The report offers a token mea culpa for not having responded fast enough to troubles at the bank. But that’s mainly a deflection from the report’s main purpose, which is to protect the Fed and bolster the Biden Administration’s financial regulatory agenda. It concedes that examiners at the San Francisco Fed flagged numerous problems at SVB well before its failure, but it says they were handcuffed by higher-ups in Washington and a 2018 law that eased regulations on mid-sized banks.

“The supervisory approach at Silicon Valley Bank was too deliberative” and “consensus-driven,” the report says.

That’s a kind way of stating that bank examiners were slow to act on glaring problems, including SVB’s failure of its own internal liquidity stress tests. Bank examiners had “31 open supervisory findings when it failed in March 2023, about triple the number observed at peer firms,” the report says. These included a November 2021 red flag on its liquidity risk management plan.

Yet SVB’s liquidity was rated “satisfactory” last August, and bank examiners dallied in escalating their warnings. Why? The report says that “the root cause of these delays around supervisory actions is difficult to ascertain.” Nonetheless, the report blames the emphasis by Mr. Barr’s predecessor Randal Quarles on easing compliance burdens. In time-honored bureaucratic fashion, blame it on your predecessor.

“In the interviews for this report, staff repeatedly mentioned changes in expectations and practices, including pressure to reduce burden on firms, meet a higher burden of proof for a supervisory conclusion, and demonstrate due process when considering supervisory action,” the report says, adding that this may have “in some cases led staff not to take action.”

But ensuring due process for banks and regulating them for safety and soundness needn’t conflict. In any event, Mr. Quarles stepped down in October 2021, and Mr. Barr took his job last July. In the subsequent eight months before SVB’s failure, bank examiners acted with no more dispatch even as deposit outflows surged and interest rates rose.

As a result, SVB had to sell long-dated securities at a loss to redeem deposits. The report claims the bank would have been in a stronger position to manage large deposit outflows and rising rates were it not for a bipartisan banking law in 2018 that eased capital and liquidity requirements for banks with less than $250 billion in assets.

Yet the report concedes that “higher supervisory and regulatory requirements may not have prevented the firm’s failure.” SVB had a higher capital ratio than big banks that are subject to more stringent regulation. Its huge portfolio of long-dated “high quality liquid assets,” such as Treasurys and government-backed mortgage securities, also turned out to be a vulnerability.

Nonetheless, Mr. Barr recommends applying such “enhanced prudential standards” to mid-sized banks. This would extend the too-big-to-fail umbrella to more banks and probably increase risk-taking by bank management. Complying with inordinately complicated regulation could also distract from safety and soundness.

The report says the Fed’s regulatory “framework is quite complicated.” You don’t say. SVB and bank supervisors spent “considerable effort seeking to understand the rules and when they apply, including the implications of different evaluation criteria, historical and prospective transition periods, cliff effects, and complicated definitions,” and SVB “regularly engaged consultants.”

In other words, SVB seems to have been more focused on complying with financial regulation than prudently managing its balance-sheet risks.

When regulators mess up, the response from regulators is always to call for more regulation.

See the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act, which was supposed to prevent big bank failures.

Wouldn’t it be nice if regulators took responsibility for their failures for a change?

Meanwhile on the Same Page

First Republic Bank Is Seized, Sold to JPMorgan in Second-Largest U.S. Bank Failure

Lender, which catered to wealthy customers, teetered for weeks following the March collapse of Silicon Valley Bank

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
May 1, 2023 6:03 pm
Muddy
Muddy
May 1, 2023 6:05 pm

Speedbox: China cannot ‘broadcast’ its intentions.

What will the trigger be? A false flag op with Chinese nationals as the victims? For internal justification, this would make sense.

Dunny Brush
Dunny Brush
May 1, 2023 6:07 pm

I see Boroondara has quietly dropped its Drag Time Story Hour with somebody called Frock Hudson with a short notes on its website. It was only a week ago that the community was advised it was going ahead in one of those pathetic magazines councils force into your letter box. It’s Pesutto’s LGA. He’ll be devastated.

Tintarella di Luna
Tintarella di Luna
May 1, 2023 6:16 pm

Farmer Gezsays:
May 1, 2023 at 8:34 am

Very evocative, elegant and eloquent comment – victimhood a la ABC

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
May 1, 2023 6:17 pm

Death and taxes, both certainties. On the matter of death, I spent time this arvo reading in the Weekend Oz the extract of John Carroll’s new book “The Saviour Syndrome: Searching for Hope and Meaning in an Age of Unbelief”. For those feeling like they’re doing the final countdown, it’s an interesting read, traversing the cultural fields of the Western search for meaning as religious certainties were and still are challenged by increasing affluence. He starts with Hamlet’s tossing up about suicide and moves to Don Quixote’s tilting at windmills as heralding the start of modern conceptions of Saviour loss and searching.

Other modern messiahs have often failed and done so with a spectacular capacity for destruction. The imagned Christ is exposed as an anti-Christ; the messiah as a flase prophet. Post-Hamlet and Quixote, the literary lineage includes Fyodor Dostoevsky’s Stavrogin, Joseph Conrad’s Kurtz, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s Gatsby and Fight Club’s Tyler Durden. In politics, the leading examples of failed redeemers were Lenin, Hitler, and Mao. In our own time Greta Thunbrg has been projected for many as a kind of world saviour.

With the religious framework removed, any notion of salvation or redemption has become vague and opaque.

Cue Samuel Beckett’s Godot. The can’t-be-bothered syndrome. So people still seek redemption but find it in family, in the birth of children, in public heroes, or in the search for a best, authentic self. But there is still always the personal possibility within us of acknowledging a saving truth, a redeemer from the hills, riding out of the wasteland.

I’d say that like the propensity to pair bond, the propensity to seek the numinous lies within us all.
That’s what he seems to be getting at.

Muddy
Muddy
May 1, 2023 6:19 pm

Re. China Vs. Taiwan: What are the chances a ‘rogue’ Chinese PLA div might attack a location to measure the Taiwanese response? (Said ‘rogue’ div is disowned in public and senior commanders ‘arrested’).

rosie
rosie
May 1, 2023 6:21 pm

Maybe the family doesn’t want that information released (yet), maybe they wanted to inform family overseas rather than have them read it in a newspaper or see it on sm.

The other usual reason is that suicide deaths beget suicide deaths.
(Someone I knew topped himself after coming home from the funeral of a mate who had committed suicide)

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
May 1, 2023 6:26 pm

Nobody wants any of this to happen but as somebody on the Cat pointed out recently, all this war talk has eerie parallels with how many Europeans must have felt in the late 1930s.

Yes. It’s been a bit unsettling to be watching the various episodes of the series on Churchill right now.
How the so blind appeasers simply could not see what was happening.

Perhaps we had to have the twentieth century in order to be able to cope with this twenty-first one.

Muddy
Muddy
May 1, 2023 6:29 pm

Lizzie: Perhaps we had to have the twentieth century in order to be able to cope with this twenty-first one.

Is there a difference between lessons observed and lessons learned?

Boambee John
Boambee John
May 1, 2023 6:31 pm

Muddysays:
May 1, 2023 at 6:19 pm
Re. China Vs. Taiwan: What are the chances a ‘rogue’ Chinese PLA div might attack a location to measure the Taiwanese response? (Said ‘rogue’ div is disowned in public and senior commanders ‘arrested’).

If you are talking about a land force division, it will need a lot of “rogue” navy types to move it, and possibly some “rogue” air force units also.

Sending some concentration camp guards in Polish uniforms against a German radio station was easier to organise.

MatrixTransform
May 1, 2023 6:35 pm

post-modernism disappears up its own sinkhole if its tenets are read strictly

there are no strict tenets

and you never read them

you’re wanking

Muddy
Muddy
May 1, 2023 6:36 pm

Gleiwitz (unsure of the spelling).

Yes, indeed: amphibious capability.
Just pondering things, B.J.
I wasn’t thinking of provocation, but intelligence gathering. The PLA is large enough to sacrifice a few thousand (not division-sized, I know) at least.

Muddy
Muddy
May 1, 2023 6:37 pm

Franz Honiok – the first man (a Pole) to be killed in the war in Europe.
Digressing now…

Zatara
Zatara
May 1, 2023 6:46 pm

I wasn’t thinking of provocation, but intelligence gathering. The PLA is large enough to sacrifice a few thousand (not division-sized, I know) at least.

That could be a bit of an own goal as the ChiComs would be giving away information about their tactics, techniques and capabilities as well. There is only so much you can hide and/or disguise in such an operation.

Winston Smith
May 1, 2023 6:52 pm

Muddy:

Re. China Vs. Taiwan: What are the chances a ‘rogue’ Chinese PLA div might attack a location to measure the Taiwanese response? (Said ‘rogue’ div is disowned in public and senior commanders ‘arrested’).

Then Taiwan gets on the wireless and tells China it is going to nuke the Three Gorges Dam and kill 300 million Chinese below it. It will render the middle of China’s food growing region an irradiated muddy desert.
Even if they don’t, the panic it sets off downstream will be beyond the PLA’s ability to stop.

Muddy
Muddy
May 1, 2023 6:52 pm

Solid point, Zatara.

Maybe I won’t get promoted to Bathtub Admiral after all.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
May 1, 2023 6:55 pm

Franz Honiok – the first man (a Pole) to be killed in the war in Europe.

Seems he was just grabbed, dressed in Polish Army uniform, and shot.

https://www.themoorlander.co.uk/the-man-who-started-the-second-world-war/

Colonel Crispin Berka
Colonel Crispin Berka
May 1, 2023 6:58 pm

Re: cohenite at 4:55pm
Okay, well they did only just change those laws like 5 minutes ago. By that I mean 2 years ago but that’s still too darn recent for me to be abreast of litigious developments.

Interesting summary here
https://stephens.com.au/changes-to-the-australian-uniform-defamation-laws-legal-update/

I was surprised to find that even if the plaintiff proves the defamation was actuated by malice and the defendant has not proven the claims to be true, the defendant may still be able to establish a public interest defence and be acquitted. At least that’s how I understand that summary.

For the purposes of the honest opinion defence, an opinion is based on proper material if:
1. the material on which it is based is:-
…(b) notorious [in the sense that the material is well-known to the public];
..AND
2. Is substantially true.

That is basically what Calli was saying. That it is widely believed would be easy to to establish.
But Latham would then have to show it happening regularly and specifically by Greenwich for it to be substantially true, which I imagine would require an ex “partner” to rat on him.
Any counterargument that Greenwich never (or infrequently) has homo sex with dirty bottoms is unlikely to be accepted by a court, just on basis of probability and the impossibility of proving a negative.

Plus, where exactly are the damages? I MEAN FINANCIAL, no innuendo answers on that one!

Speedbox
May 1, 2023 7:00 pm

Muddy says:
May 1, 2023 at 6:05 pm
What will the trigger be? A false flag op with Chinese nationals as the victims? For internal justification, this would make sense.

For sure. Imagine a scenario where the ‘harassment’ of Chinese nationals is underway, shots fired, some Chinese dead, rioting in the streets, more shots fired, looting, police being shot at, Taiwan military take action to quell disorder, more shooting etc etc…… breakdown of civil order (allegedly)….. China steps in to protect its citizens. Fighting between Taiwanese and Chinese soldiers…… China ramps up military engagement to protect its troops who were only trying to act as peace-keepers as Taiwan officials had lost control……

Plenty of scenarios Muddy. Who doesn’t think that China has, and continues to place, groups (gangs) of willing patriots into Taiwan? “Your time is coming Comrade and you will be a hero of the reunification”.

Cassie of Sydney
May 1, 2023 7:00 pm

Gary Hardgrave on Credlin, speaking about Pusotto….

“Fair dinkum, put a bit of cement in your coffee Pusotto, toughen up, man up, have a view”.

Alamak!
Alamak!
May 1, 2023 7:09 pm

and a 2018 law that eased regulations on mid-sized banks.

As in 2008 its shocking to some, mostly the Fed and well-connected Pollies, that removing restrictions on Banks leads to trouble further down the track.

Who could have ever forecast that weakened capital & liquidity standards would ever lead to weakened banks? Good thing its never going to happen again … except it’s about 98% sure that actions taken in this time will come back to cause 100X bigger issues next time due to limited size of the FDIC bailout funds.

Alamak!
Alamak!
May 1, 2023 7:14 pm

MatrixTransform> I learned everything that’s possible to know about Post:Modernism from this link

Deep stuff but somehow I managed …

Muddy
Muddy
May 1, 2023 7:17 pm

Winston Smith says:
May 1, 2023 at 6:52 pm

China will rely on international pressure on Taiwan to ‘show restraint.’ The incident was not ordered by the CCP after all. “Here, we’ll prove it by executing the divisional commander in public.”

OR, maybe Muddy needs to return to latrine digging duties.

Eyrie
Eyrie
May 1, 2023 7:23 pm

Part of the problem being peoples longing for a Armageddon

Immanantize the Eschaton!

Muddy
Muddy
May 1, 2023 7:29 pm

Zulu: Seems he was just grabbed, dressed in Polish Army uniform, and shot.

After the Battle magazine did a great article on the incident maybe seven or eight years ago. I don’t have that issue any longer, but I recall that he was drugged, and yes, dressed in uniform, placed on the ground while still semi-conscious, and executed. I cannot recall why he had been in police custody, but I think it was something minor.

Vicki
Vicki
May 1, 2023 7:36 pm

Looking forward to Greenwich explaining that such actions are perfectly natural and should be celebrated, not reviled.

In this age of reversal of norms, it would not surprise me if this is exactly what is argued.

Boambee John
Boambee John
May 1, 2023 7:44 pm

Muddysays:
May 1, 2023 at 6:36 pm
Gleiwitz (unsure of the spelling).

Yes, indeed: amphibious capability.
Just pondering things, B.J.
I wasn’t thinking of provocation, but intelligence gathering. The PLA is large enough to sacrifice a few thousand (not division-sized, I know) at least.

They lost around 30,000 dead in Vietnam in 1979, without actually engaging the Regular PAVN forces. And went home with their tails between their legs.

And they now have the political stinging nettle of the Little Emperors, sole sons from the One-Child Policy, to grasp now. Not saying that will prevent them from acting, but they will need quick and decisive victory, of there will be rumblings, not just among the peasants.

JC
JC
May 1, 2023 7:45 pm

Almanac

Except, of course, that some Fed governors have claimed the problem was caused by the Fed itself. And the most important thing about the problem is this: Easing up on bank regulations for mid-sized banks after the GFC wasn’t the problem. The issue is that the government bonds, which the problem banks bought during the low rate regime, fell in value due to the vertical rise in short-term interest rates, placing a magnifying glass on the part of the balance sheet that was never touched by the relatively recent de-regulation of small to mid-sized banks. You’re jut a dunce with no interesting views to share.

Vicki
Vicki
May 1, 2023 7:47 pm

On the matter of death, I spent time this arvo reading in the Weekend Oz the extract of John Carroll’s new book “The Saviour Syndrome: Searching for Hope and Meaning in an Age of Unbelief”. For those feeling like they’re doing the final countdown, it’s an interesting read, traversing the cultural fields of the Western search for meaning as religious certainties were and still are challenged by increasing affluence.

Lizzie, I generally really enjoy Carroll’s work. But I thought this extract seemed a little aimless itself. His observations about current society and its direction, as usual, were prescient. But somehow it didn’t deliver the sort of deep insights and moral direction as his past commentaries do.

Maybe it’s just me and my concern for where we are all heading. I wanted some hope from Carroll & I didn’t find it. Again, maybe it’s just me.

Indolent
Indolent
May 1, 2023 7:50 pm
Salvatore, Understaffed & Overworked Martyr to Govt Covid Stupidity

What’s Greenwich’s gripe?
He’s been out & proud for years, Latham did not “out” him.
The mechanics of sodomy are well-known, Latham hardly blew the whistle on an activity that is secret.
Latham did not even say sodomy is disgusting, he enquired how it compared to how disgusting Greenwich has said Latham to be.

Have a long careful think Alex m’boy, about how this could pan out.

JC
JC
May 1, 2023 7:53 pm

Old Ozzie

First Republic failed and have a couple of other banks, but even though the Fed caused this, I really find it difficult to even blame them (the Fed).

The Fed should have begun t0 tighten monetary policy just after June 2021. The Omni variant then hit and the world again moved back towards pandemic restrictions such as lock-downs. The Fed made the choice that it needed to continue with easy monetary policy, which was really a very tough call. The Fed guessed wrongly and we are where we are. Harry Hindsight is always 100% right though.

These banks failures are the result of a pretty shitty 3 or 4 years we’ve lived through. We need to just move on.

Perplexed of Brisbane
Perplexed of Brisbane
May 1, 2023 7:55 pm

Muddy says:
May 1, 2023 at 6:05 pm
What will the trigger be? A false flag op with Chinese nationals as the victims? For internal justification, this would make sense.

An attack on a TV Station (?) It worked once before.

duncanm
duncanm
May 1, 2023 7:56 pm

Surely Greenwich’s peers are all gay, so right in to butt sex (and worse).

How is he being humiliated in front of them?

Indolent
Indolent
May 1, 2023 7:56 pm
Rabz
May 1, 2023 8:00 pm

The Real Reason Why Fox Fired Tucker Carlson

Err, how many “real reasons” are there?

Vicki
Vicki
May 1, 2023 8:01 pm

Personally, I think the Taiwanese Foreign Minister is being very optimistic in suggesting a 2027 date. I reckon the next 18 months is more likely with Western armaments at historic low levels (despite some ramp up in production now underway)

Can’t understand why this isn’t argued more frequently – although the late Jim Molan did warn last year (“Danger on our Doorstep”) that it would likely occur within the next few years. The media (except for SMH’s Peter Hartcher) almost totally ignored this until the new government began to make noises of concern. On the other hand, as I recall Sun Tzu placed a lot of emphasis on breaking up your enemies’ alliances….so maybe the recent Chinese disruption of the western alliances is a sort of scary foreplay.

Indolent
Indolent
May 1, 2023 8:06 pm
cohenite
May 1, 2023 8:08 pm

Okay, well they did only just change those laws like 5 minutes ago. By that I mean 2 years ago but that’s still too darn recent for me to be abreast of litigious developments.

Ok; well the Uniform Defamation Laws did come into law in 2006. The 2021 amendments you linked to are a further part of their evolution. The new public interest defence applies to the publisher as compared to the author: Twatter compared to Latham. There have been cases however which are ambiguous about whether public platforms like twatter and space chook are publishers and the author assumes that role.

Greenwich is going to be very hyperbolic and emotional in establishing his hurt:

“I’ve been openly gay in public life for 15 years and in parliament for over 10 years, and never have I experienced such a homophobic, sexualised attack that exposed me to contempt, ridicule and extreme abuse, based on my sexuality,” Greenwich said.

It’s also relevant that Latham’s alleged defamation etc was in response to Greenwich’s arguably more defamatory comment about Latham:

‘Mark Latham is a disgusting human being and people who are considering voting for One Nation need to realise they are voting for an extremely hateful and dangerous individual who risks causing a great deal of damage to our state’

I don’t think Latham has any concerns with the defamation and S.474.17 complaints. The HRC however is another matter.

JC
JC
May 1, 2023 8:08 pm

Rabz says:
May 1, 2023 at 8:00 pm

The Real Reason Why Fox Fired Tucker Carlson

Err, how many “real reasons” are there?

We’ll likely never know. He can’t discuss it and the Murdoch’s won’t either, so we’ll never know the definitive.

Old Lefty
Old Lefty
May 1, 2023 8:09 pm

The GayBC reports on abuse charges against a teacher. Doesn’t name the school(s) – i.e. they must be government schools. Doesn’t name the teacher to (supposedly) protect the identity of the complainant – further proof that she must be a state school teacher. And by the way, she’s a lezzo. Would any of this bending over backwards (or is it forwards?) to protect the names of people and places have applied if it was a non-government school? We don’t even need to ask.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-05-01/wa-teacher-admits-sexual-abuse-student/102286248

JC
JC
May 1, 2023 8:10 pm

And and I bet, I bet, Carlson was never told the reason. Practically, he hasn’t been fired as he will be on the payroll for another couple of years. All that happened was that his show was taken off the air.

Old Lefty
Old Lefty
May 1, 2023 8:16 pm

Human Rights Commission = Marxist pervert brain-laundry.

But eill Greenwich persevere in a real court if it means being cross-examined about his sexual habits?

Informed sources say the NT chief minister and her lackeys settled with the police commissioner because they didn’t fancy a cross-examination from Arthur Moses.

Pity Fyles and Chalker couldn’t both lose.

cohenite
May 1, 2023 8:19 pm
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
May 1, 2023 8:26 pm

Is there a difference between lessons observed and lessons learned?

One likes to think something has sunk in, but of course history is about repeating mistakes if it is ignored. We’ve certainly been given plenty of guidance as to what can go wrong. Sadly, idiots like Biden calling himself on the right side of history do great damage to what history has actually taught us. The loss of educational memory is also something we need to consider; rewriting of history to suit ideology.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
May 1, 2023 8:30 pm

Earlier:

Knuckle Draggersays:
May 1, 2023 at 5:06 pm

Go get your booster!

Well I would, but there are a few things I want to do first:

1. Help a Minnesota accountant into a more comfortable retirement by giving him money because he says he can (yet fails to) accurately predict earthquakes;
2. Track down the dastardly rotter who built the BOM weather-changing laser/radar beams operating from each of their secret spy locations masquerading as weather stations, and who disguise said beams as normal atmospheric conditions when viewed from satellites;
3. Get a really big shovel and dig out some billion-year-old rocks that are really trees from the Bible; and
4. Work out where the billion people killed in the last eighteen months went.

As soon as I’ve done all that*, then yeah. Sure, champ.

*Also when St.Kilda wins another flag, and not before.

Cassie of Sydney
May 1, 2023 8:30 pm

“What’s Greenwich’s gripe?
He’s been out & proud for years, Latham did not “out” him.
The mechanics of sodomy are well-known, Latham hardly blew the whistle on an activity that is secret.
Latham did not even say sodomy is disgusting, he enquired how it compared to how disgusting Greenwich has said Latham to be.”

Look, this action by creepy crybaby Greenwich has absolutely nothing to do with Latham’s tweet, it’s about silencing Latham and by extension silencing people like us. We are now living in a homosexual tyranny, they are emboldened and they will use their new found power. All of this was inevitable, which is why I voted NO to SSM. It hasn’t helped Latham that so many on the “right” like Blot, have also joined in the condemnation.

Every Friday in mosques in Western Sydney far worse is said about gays, but those words don’t concern Greenwich for a number of reasons, one is that he naively thinks, like many progressives, that he can ally with the adherents of the religion of pieces in order to demonise, smear and shut down the right. Creepy crybaby Greenwich refuses to realise that he’s walking into a deadly trap and that when the shit hits the fan (pardon the pun), homosexuals will be dealt with ruthlessly by the religion of pieces.

The irony of all of this is that Latham probably voted yes to SSM. I also don’t think Latham is inherently homophobic, he was responding to creepy crybaby Greenwich’s insult..and it was Greenwich who started this melee…not Latham.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
May 1, 2023 8:31 pm

The coronation that nobody cares about.

Interesting how Charlie increasingly sounds so much like Charles I.
Green king, head of every religion, noblesse oblige.
“Let the proles eat cake” is not a great message to send. Just saying.

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
May 1, 2023 8:32 pm

The screech will fix this.

We know it won’t. It reminds me of my son-in-law the other nite telling us about similar young boys seeking out cars in his area, coming down into his backyard, and how he leaves the keys downstairs on the island benchtop where they can be easily found, rather than having the little buggers perhaps carrying knives come upstairs and peer into his sleeping children’s bedrooms before entering his, all for the keys. These invading kids don’t like to be thwarted and don’t have any of the controls of normally socialised kids. They just lash out.

The owners of that Merc must also be feeling terrible that their car was used as a killer weapon.
All sympathies to the families of those killed, a terrible tragedy for them.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
May 1, 2023 8:48 pm

These invading kids don’t like to be thwarted and don’t have any of the controls of normally socialised kids. They just lash out.

Without wanting to start a barney, here are some words defence counsel routinely use whenever some maladjusted scrote injures or kills normal people:

Kids
No controls
Not normally socialised
Lashed out

There’s a book full of them, but these are some of the go-tos and they are designed to infer that a) the poor darlings don’t really understand, and b) it is someone else’s fault.

No.

If you break into somebody else’s house that somebody else paid for, and where you and your family are entitled to feel safe, you roll the dice. You either get chased out, or if you want to take the occupants on then you’re flipping a coin.

Ask Ricky Slater. Oh wait, you can’t. Nobody can, because he flipped that coin and it came up tails.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
May 1, 2023 8:52 pm

The screech will fix this.

The screech will bring in tribal punishment for such crimes.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
May 1, 2023 9:01 pm

Treasury blocks Parliamentary Budget Office from ‘methodology and ­assumptions’ of franking credits crackdown

Exclusive
By GEOFF CHAMBERS
Chief Political Correspondent
@Chambersgc
8:23PM May 1, 2023
No Comments

Treasury has blocked the Parliamentary Budget Office from ­accessing “methodology and ­assumptions” underpinning the Albanese government’s franking credits crackdown, sparking claims Labor is politicising the nation’s peak economic department.

Ahead of the first public hearings of the Senate inquiry into Labor’s franking credits reforms in Sydney on Tuesday, The Australian can reveal Treasury has refused to disclose information to the PBO “owing to concerns around taxpayer confidentiality”.

In a letter to NSW Liberal senator Andrew Bragg last Friday, the PBO said the “relevant agency” had invoked a “memorandum of understanding” allowing government departments to not disclose information.

Senator Bragg had requested costings from the PBO, which has completed analysis for the Greens and crossbenchers, in ­relation to changes to franked distributions funded by capital raisings.

The PBO told Senator Bragg it was unable to process his ­request for details of the methodology and assumptions underlying the government’s measure proposed in schedule 5 of its Treasury laws amendment bill currently before the parliament.

“According to the memorandum of understanding between the Parliamentary Budget Office and government agencies, the PBO may only disclose information provided from an agency to a client with the approval of the agency,” the PBO letter said.

“The PBO has sought the ­information from the relevant agency and, owing to concerns around taxpayer confidentiality, the agency has not agreed to disclosure of the information to the client.”

Senator Bragg, who will grill Treasury officials as deputy chair of the Senate economics legislation committee leading the franking credits inquiry, told The Australian it was “unacceptable for Labor to use the Treasury as a shield for its protection racket”.

“The government claims these changes will add $10m per year to the budget. Yet, when I asked the PBO to cost the policy, and provide the methodology, the Treasury refused to disclose its modelling. The Labor Party is politicising the Treasury by preventing it from co-operating with the PBO,” he said.

“Australians have a right to know the basis and key assumptions for these changes. During the election, Labor promised not to touch franking credits. Instead of outright banning franking credits, Labor is proposing a new test that would stuff the franking system.”

Government sources said they were unaware of Treasury’s decision to not disclose information to the PBO in response to Senator Bragg’s request.

Labor’s franking credits reforms would raise $550m from aligning the “tax treatment of off-market share buybacks undertaken by listed public companies with the treatment of on-market share buybacks”. A second measure, slated to raise $10m a year, would stop companies paying dividends and ­restrict access to franking credits for individual shareholders.

What’s that slimy little P.O.S. up to now?

bespoke
bespoke
May 1, 2023 9:07 pm
Salvatore, Understaffed & Overworked Martyr to Govt Covid Stupidity

Look, this action by creepy crybaby Greenwich has absolutely nothing to do with Latham’s tweet

Quite so Cassie.
However Greenwich has to pretend it is all about da hurten suffring from being ridiculed.
Emotion may fly on twitter, among j’ismists & so on. When it comes to black letter law, he may find it more difficult. (eg: Brittany Higgins)

Coz “I wanta silence people I don’t like” isn’t a reason to sue (not yet anyway)

Salvatore, Understaffed & Overworked Martyr to Govt Covid Stupidity

Just when you think you’ve seen it all: Phone a job applicant earlier, she announced that she prefers to text, so ended the call & sent a text saying she’s ready to conduct the interview, by text.

Good luck with that, love.
Not entirely sure how this method is going to work well for her.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
May 1, 2023 9:22 pm

she prefers to text

I’m sure Centrelink has a text number.

Somewhere.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
May 1, 2023 9:22 pm

Anybody taking any bets that the next revenue grab by the Albanese Government will be death duties?

cohenite
May 1, 2023 9:23 pm

The screech will bring in tribal punishment for such crimes.

Be good if it would but not for killing white women it won’t.

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
May 1, 2023 9:30 pm

Latham’s silk….

Mr Greenwich – do you hit the mud button when mounting your male friend?

Err, yes.

When you pull out is your cock covered in shit?

Err, well, yes, sometimes. Rather a lot really.

I rest me case yer Honour.

Salvatore, Understaffed & Overworked Martyr to Govt Covid Stupidity

I’m sure Centrelink has a text number.

Lol.
She won’t be eligible though, she’s almost certainly a French national. (method used to determine this: attitude + name + accent)

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
May 1, 2023 9:32 pm

Be good if it would but not for killing white women it won’t.

The tribal elders of the ZuluKiloTwoAlpha mob have decreed that for killing a white woman, you will be taken into the bush, and have your legs smashed with a stone club. Should you be able to dance the hornpipe down the main road, into town, you will be pardoned, and set free.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
May 1, 2023 9:37 pm

When you pull out is your cock covered in shit?

Well it depends on the day.

What do you mean, exactly?
I mean romantic interludes are best not planned for Taco Tuesdays.

No further questions.

Salvatore, Understaffed & Overworked Martyr to Govt Covid Stupidity

Well it depends on the day.

Oh brother, the cross-examination of the mincing offendee would be a week of delight for court reporting!

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
May 1, 2023 9:57 pm

Republicans demand Albanese stay silent during Coronation loyalty oath
Paul Sakkal
By Paul Sakkal
Updated May 1, 2023 — 6.28pmfirst published at 6.25pm

Leaders of the Australian push to ditch the monarchy want the prime minister to remain silent when guests at King Charles’ coronation are invited to pledge allegiance to the new monarch.

For the first time, Australians and citizens of other Commonwealth nations will be invited to swear allegiance to the King and raise “a chorus of millions of voices” supporting “their undoubted King, defender of all”.

Doesn’t refusal to take the oath of loyalty to the new monarch earn you a one way trip to the chopping block?

Salvatore, Understaffed & Overworked Martyr to Govt Covid Stupidity

If Plod prosecute Latho, coz complaint by Greenwich, that’ll set a benchmark that could see quite a few people in trouble.
Marcia Langton, for one. This comment of hers is far from the only one she’s made that’s far worse than anything Latho has ever said.

Indolent
Indolent
May 1, 2023 10:06 pm
GreyRanga
GreyRanga
May 1, 2023 10:06 pm

Knuckles I asked Ricky Slater, he said he’s dead beat at the moment.

Zatara
Zatara
May 1, 2023 10:08 pm

Conservative Reforms at New College in Florida Are Sending the Left Into a Panic

“This Is What the Right-Wing Takeover of a Progressive College Looks Like”

The left owns higher education and has for decades. They see progressive control as the norm in academia, so to them this looks and feels like a hostile takeover, which it kind of is.

“I wish Dr. Lepinski well and look forward to recruiting his replacement. We are restoring classical liberal arts education at New College and any faculty that prefer the old system of unfettered left-wing activism and a rubber-stamp board are free to self-select out.”

“They fired its chief diversity officer and dismantled the diversity, equity and inclusion office…people sent me photographs of gender-neutral signage scraped off school bathrooms”

Chipping away at it.

Nelson_Kidd-Players
May 1, 2023 10:09 pm

Just leaving this here. No judgement.

https://twitter.com/Maladroithe/status/1651662526336372736

Alamak!
Alamak!
May 1, 2023 10:11 pm

And the most important thing about the problem is this: Easing up on bank regulations for mid-sized banks after the GFC wasn’t the problem

JC – you are confusing cause and effect. First they reduced oversight on on banks worth up to 250BN in 2018 and then after 2018 SVB went bust because they had no risk officer in place, had no ALM strategy and apparently zero idea of the duration or concentration risk implied by loading up on treasuries vs a floating deposit base that could move any time.

If the oversight had not been reduced this amateur approach would have been rumbled on the first view of their risk model or stress test results … which the Fed noted in its own report.

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
May 1, 2023 10:13 pm

Is that Greenwich humping his friend?

Gabor
Gabor
May 1, 2023 10:14 pm

Also when St.Kilda wins another flag, and not before.

That was grossly unfair and below the belt even.
We have suffered long and hard, but our glorious day will come.

My tatts win looks more promising alas.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
May 1, 2023 10:14 pm

Marcia Langton, for one

Wasn’t she part of the Marxist Socialist Worker’s Party, back in the 1970’s?

thefrollickingmole
thefrollickingmole
May 1, 2023 10:33 pm

Nelson

Witnessed!

Dot
Dot
May 1, 2023 10:50 pm

SVB went bust because they had no risk officer in place

Stop bullshitting.

H B Bear
H B Bear
May 1, 2023 10:57 pm

Openly gay. Except for the buggery it would appear.

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
May 1, 2023 11:11 pm

Maybe it’s just me and my concern for where we are all heading. I wanted some hope from Carroll & I didn’t find it. Again, maybe it’s just me.

Vicki, I was very aware that I was reading an edited extract. The sudden last paragraph conclusion seemed quite out of place. So I think in fairness one should read the whole book. Not my choice at present for bedtime reading though. In another life I did know John Carroll via academia. He was one of the good guys even back then in the 1970’s.

I’m going for escapism – I have a copy of Amor Towles ‘Lincoln Highway’ ready and waiting, billed as ‘an extraordinary journey through 1950’s America from the pen of a master storyteller’. Well, I really like his other American history tale, ‘The Rules of Civility’, and ‘A Gentleman in Moscow’ is still one of my favorite recent novels and he did personally write to me commending my review of it in Quadrant – all good reasons to proceed into the nearly six hundred pages of it tonight.

Signing off here now to start it. 🙂

Sancho Panzer
Sancho Panzer
May 1, 2023 11:23 pm

rosiesays:

May 1, 2023 at 3:22 pm

Watched that Danish miniseries on the serial killer nurse Christiana Hansen last night.

wow!
120+ kills

most nurse serial killers – and there are a lot – are male

is this one an exception?

Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
Elizabeth (Lizzie) Beare
May 1, 2023 11:35 pm

Without wanting to start a barney, here are some words defence counsel routinely use whenever some maladjusted scrote injures or kills normal people:

Kids
No controls
Not normally socialised
Lashed out

Well, its just the truth of it, and I’m not stating it from the point of view of the defense counsel who wants them let off scot free but from the point of view of the homeowner who leaves his car keys downstairs to avoid his family having these intruders anywhere near them upstairs should they remove some louvres and get in. Homeowner knows these out-of-control unsocialised kids could kill his family if they are thwarted, for they have form in this. They are wild animals. Feral children.

They need incarceration and re-socialising. Not bail. Nor forgiveness. Nor a rap on the knuckles.

Alamak!
Alamak!
May 2, 2023 12:27 am

Dot > don’t believe me, then perhaps Fortune is credible enough for you.

See https://fortune.com/2023/03/10/silicon-valley-bank-chief-risk-officer

Dunny Brush
Dunny Brush
May 2, 2023 12:18 pm

New Mexico’s premier cycling road race introduce equal prize money for men and women this year. I see a trans walked off with the women’s cheque. Take that girls!

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