Are you feeling lucky, punk.
Open Thread – Tues 22 Aug 2023
- Open Thread – Mon 25 Nov 2024
- The more you gets the less you eats
- Open Thread – Weekend 23 Nov 2024
- Open Thread – Thurs 21 Nov 2024
- Open Thread – Mon 18 Nov 2024
He looked like he has been opening for the last 10 years. And as for the opening bowlers.
Effin Lying Labor, the heroes for the other side.
Oops, got all the links wrong. Cash!
Did Tucker put the acid on Trump why he didn’t pardon Assange?
Fact free, me! me! me!
But full of self praise. Given the history of exhibitionism, to be expected.
She is the only person on the planet who claims that videos of dance classes for 80 year olds are good for anything but a very particular kind of porn.
Multiple upticks.
Seems to be quite a lot of comprehension fail around here regarding how many boxes are on the Ref. form
If there is nothing in the ‘yes’ box but a cross in the ‘no’ then voter intention is clear.
There is only ONE box .. you write YES or NO ..!
Should have fleshed it out .. what he is saying is a tick will be accepted as YES but a cross(X) won’t be accepted as NO .. straight out con .. FFS!
If the requirement is the word .. YES or NO then anything else should be invalid ..
or a tick means YES & X means NO ..
The name of the game is confusion and a hope that the English is a 2/3/4 language mob will be lulled into their usual voting habit .. tick or X .. then you invalidate the X and accept the tick .. what could be fairer! .. LOL!
Dotty Dot of Dottiness go and play with you willy wonkas and with JC and JD and…………………With Mrs Stncho Pantyhose………………..And learn sum’fink.
The Russians have won and you are too thick to know it. The UKR is gone as a Country.
Thank the Yanks for that one.
Tom
I’m sorry, the economics of running planes goes out the window when I step inside and take a seat as I don’t care if the thing does 10 gallons a mile or 20. I just want to get there in one piece. Only the US should be making planes as it’s actually an act against nature itself for anyone else to be in that business , much less Brazilians.
On a serious note, I always thought it’s the buyer who decides in the engine maker and not the plane manufacture. Is that right?
Engines GE’s are pretty decent, but what better way to travel than an American made plane with Rolls Royce engines? You want to get to the destination in one piece.
Trump’s 757 has Rollers, so only the best.
Australia creating “nuclear office” … gives job to EY
https://theklaxon.com.au/ztem-58/?utm_source=mailpoet&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=the-klaxon-weekly-newsletter-26
I missed the mainstream media coverage of this.
The poor dears must be run off their feet covering The Voice.
I think that nasty little corrupt try-on is about to go down the gurgler now that it has been sprung, good and hard. We will see a revision and the AEC moron will be forced to eat his words in public.
The military don’t start wars. Politicians start wars.
= William Westmoreland
I’m listening to the Tucker interview with the Trumpster. Lord he’s funny. He’s talking about Hiden and says something like, did you see him at the beach, he looks terrible at the beach as he can’t even walk in sand. He can’t even lift his legs over the sand. hahahahahahha
An inescapable conclusion.
They always use many…many words to try to cover up malfeasance. The wordier the reasoning, the more suspect it is.
1. has never been a declared Kremlin war aim. 2 and 3 were declared days before Feb 24. Same for 4, preposterous to state back end of ’22 given Surovikin declared that Russia was on the defensive in Oct. Re 5, is that two over last 17 months? F-16s are good plane but we’ve had a whole range of equipment that hasn’t really changed anything overall.
But let’s just leave this aside, Are you surprised by how underwhelming this counteroffensive has been given the manpower, training, planning and equipment that has been devoted to it?
Trump’s 757 has Rollers, so only the best.
And I only did my best in 1976…………..
117M
Views
Why hasn’t Russia won yet?
Funnily enough, the first thing we had to do in a year’s study of epidemiological methods was critique two published RCT blood pressure papers for study design and for the statistical analytic methods used. I went to town on both and knew then I was going to enjoy this course. I tore the methodology to shreds for its confounders which of course then delegitimated the stats, no matter how pretty or clever they were. First things first. Long ago and far away now though. Some things may have improved, but the field is open to work with limit value. Made me see though that all science can be like that. There’s a lot of sorting of wheat from chaff in it. Hence ‘climate science’.
LOL, JC. Just stick to anything with Rollers or GE providing the power and you can’t go wrong.
It’s now official in aero engine land: Pratt and Whitney is s**t. P&W is so bad the Russians should own them.
LOL
Don’t answer a question with a different question, dot.
Well hopefully enough pressure from Ben Fordham and Sky presenters will see Tom exercise his wriggle room and fix the biased scenario.
I can see a beaut Leak cartoon coming soon.
So any thing said here that gets moderated, Sounds like Tennis Elbow to me. FFS
Stalker alert up thread.
You know the one, guys. Stalker never ever talks about what Stalker is doing.
Always factual, no opinions at all. Stalker is so wonderful. Strong. Decisive.
Stalking is pathetic behaviour. Headcase.
It’s automoderated by WP because you’ve changed the handle but used the same email.
Facts and truth beat disinformation every time. KW is a national treasure imho.
https://quadrant.org.au/magazine/2023/08-online/why-aborigines-always-had-the-vote/
Three million to Reynolds sounds about right.
Oh no, I’m NOT surprised.
Russia has dug in, but Ukraine seems to be saying they are destroying Russian assets with HIMARS and drones. Strategic bombers and command centres, which are more valuable than tanks and IFVs. 270 mn USD per unit and dead generals and colonels that don’t grow overnight. Russia has dug in, but what have we seen other than two photos of destroyed tanks and IFVs?
So why hasn’t Russia won yet? This has NEVER been answered.
If a claim is that Russia has won, there has to be a concession that Putin either had different war aims or really leant into the idea of expendable soldiers. His gains were at a massive cost and a costly withdrawal from Kiev at that.
If Russia has won then the F-16s will do nothing at all and Ukraine must be ready to lose much of their east and be comfortable with the Russians occupying that and dictating terms to them.
That’s not going to happen.
Russia has won clapped-out battlefields with millions of migrants fleeing westward before they occupied the land and at least a million citizens from pre-2022 Russia have emigrated globally. They’ve lost c 260k dead soldiers and 700,00 wounded, c 4400 tanks and have built almost NO new tanks. Remember when the T-14 Armatas were going to win these land battles, with “tank cities” cranking them out prodigiously.
Ukraine may well be ruined. Russia has lost a mass of conventional ability and accelerated its own demographic decline to do so. They already were losing 160k more to deaths than births, even with Putin basically outlawing abortion.
Not to mention there was a bizarre coup attempt (?) that also happened after Prigozhin saw 20,000 Wagner soldiers die to capture Bakhmut – which Ukraine never denied was strategic, but Russian boosters swore was going to break Ukraine.
It didn’t. If Russia is clearly winning, why a coup attempt? The winner of a war having a coup attempt against them during a war is not common. The last example I can remember was the French mutiny in WWI.
If it is a war of attrition it could drag on for many more years. Even if the odds favour Russia, the result is not certain. The US pulled out of Vietnam and Russia pulled out of Afghanistan (and so did Biden). Winning takes more than clearing objectives.
I would agree with that. (Pointless comment. An uptick would have sufficed – IF they had been restored.)
I thought Aborigines were “Flora and Fauna” until 1967?
Some Light Late night Reading
https://treasury.gov.au/publication/2023-intergenerational-report
https://treasury.gov.au/sites/default/files/2023-08/p2023-435150.pdf – only 296 Pages
Intergenerational Report 2023 at a glance – Fact Sheet 2 Pages
Supply and demand (the NT News):
Oh my word.
There we go. Nothing to see here.
A subscription to the Paywallian costs around $40 per month. In my opinion, it’s well worth just it for the investigative work of Sharri Markson, who is unravelling the political censorship of Australian and US government scientists to protect the Chinese Communist Party’s military research which produced the global Kung Flu virus in 2019.
Markson has an extensive report in tomorrow’s paper — essential reading that will go straight into my research files.
I wonder if these stats are true. Incredible.
@robkhenderson
And
Thank you Mak. I have forwarded Windschuttle’s article on to my daughter – I know she will find it useful both for herself but more importantly, the grandsons.
Unfortunately they cannot escape the black armband view regardless of being out of the state system. It’s interesting on a number of levels too – the boys can trace one forebear back to China, and it appears that he (or his descendants) also had the vote.
This shyte is what happens when hard, documented history is replaced with stories. Very lucrative stories, as it turns out.
What Australia will look like in 40 years
Michael Read
Economics correspondent
Treasurer Jim Chalmers has handed down the latest Intergenerational Report.
The five-yearly report from the federal government (although this one comes two years after then treasurer Josh Frydenberg’s two years ago) predicts what the country will look like in 40 years’ time and the state of the nation’s finances.
This is what it says about Australia in 2063.
Population
Australians will live longer, healthier lives over the next four decades.
By 2063, about 40.5 million people are predicted to call Australia home as a result of sustained population growth, which is projected to fall from its current annual rate of 2 per cent to just 0.8 per cent.
While net overseas migration has trended higher in recent decades, Treasury assumes it remains constant for the next 40 years at 235,000 people a year, though it admits this forecast is uncertain.
Australia will be older due to the twin forces of increasing life expectancy and low fertility.
Female life expectancy is expected to increase to 89.5 years from 85.2 years, while male life expectancy is predicted to increase to 87 years from 81.3 years
As a result, the number of Australians aged over 65 will more than double by 2063, while the number of people older than 85 will more than triple.
The fertility rate, which is the average number of babies per woman, is expected to remain at about 1.6. Since deaths will grow at a faster rate than births, the annual rate of growth in the population from “natural increase” will average just 0.3 per cent over the next 40 years.
Economy
Australia’s $2.2 trillion economy is forecast to be 2½ times larger by 2062-63 and real incomes about 50 per cent higher.
But GDP growth is expected to average just 2.2 per cent a year over the next four decades, compared to the 3.1 per cent annual gains experienced over the past 40 years.
That would be the slowest sustained rate of economic growth since World War II. The slowdown principally reflects a fall in productivity growth.
Meanwhile, the care and support sector is forecast to grow alongside the ageing of the population and the rapid expansion of the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
Government spending on health, aged care and the National Disability Insurance Scheme is expected to increase to 10.7 per cent of gross domestic product by 2063, up from 6.2 per cent today.
The mining sector is also predicted to evolve over the next four decades, shifting away from fossil fuels and towards critical minerals as a result of the transition to net zero.
Participation
An ageing Australia means a declining share of people will be in work.
The share of the population aged over 65 is forecast to increase to 23 per cent from 17 per cent, reducing the size of the workforce.
As a result, the current record labour force participation rate of 66.6 per cent is expected to gradually decline, hitting 63.8 per cent in 2063.
But this forecast may not come to pass. Previous intergenerational reports have all predicted participation declines, only to be proven wrong by growing rates of participation among women and older Australians, as well as growth in the young migrant population.
The elderly have had more opportunities to participate thanks to greater availability of less physically demanding jobs in the service sector, and shifting cultural norms.
In 2063, those in the labour force will put in fewer hours on average than today’s workers. The report predicts the multi-decade decline in average hours worked will continue, falling from 32 hours a week today to 31 hours by 2063.
Productivity
Productivity is expected to grow at 1.2 per cent a year over the next 40 years, which was the average rate of growth over the past 20 years.
The decline in productivity growth over the past decade has been experienced across advanced economies, and has manifested in fewer new businesses being created and fewer Australians switching jobs.
The growth in the care economy is one of the factors weighing on productivity growth, since the services sector is generally less productive than other parts of the economy.
The outcomes in the report are highly sensitive to the productivity assumption.
If productivity instead grew by 1.5 per cent a year for the next 40 years, which was the assumption contained in the 2021 report, then the economy would be almost 10 per cent larger by 2063 than the baseline forecast.
The speed at which productivity grows will be pivotal for future incomes. Treasury estimates that productivity gains accounted for more than two-thirds of the 48 per cent increase in real wages over the past 30 years.
Climate change and energy
Australia will be warmer in 2063 than it is today.
The report cites the intergovernmental panel on climate change, which warns average temperature rises are likely to exceed 1.5 degrees before 2100, potentially before 2040.
It says that workers in certain industries, especially agriculture, construction, manufacturing and services, may need to lower their exposure to heat or face occupational safety risks.
Increased frequency of natural disasters is expected to weigh on farm output and will also lead to strong growth in federal government expenditure on disaster relief.
The transition to renewables will reshape the energy system as wind, solar, and battery storage displace fossil fuels in the national electricity market.
The budget
Despite recording a surplus this year, the federal government’s budget is expected to tip back into deficit and stay there for the next 40 years.
Treasury expects spending as a share of GDP to increase from 24.8 per cent to 28.6 per cent over the next four decades, but it assumes the tax take remains constant at 26 per cent of GDP.
Initially, deficits will be a relatively small share of GDP, and gross debt will decline from 39.3 per cent of GDP to 22.5 per cent by 2049.
But those deficits will become increasingly large as a result of mounting spending pressures from health and the NDIS, and from 2049 gross debt to GDP will start to increase.
However, debt will remain very low by international standards.
Government spending
The big five spending pressures over the next 40 years will be health, aged care, the NDIS, defence, and interest payments on government debt.
Spending on these categories as a share of GDP will increase to 14.4 per cent from 8.8 per cent over the next four decades.
The ageing of the population accounts for 40 per cent of the increase, since it leads to increased spending on health and aged care, though this is partly offset with a modest decline in spending on education.
The fastest growing item will be the NDIS, which is expected to expand by 7 per cent a year.
Slowing the $42 billion program’s rapid growth trajectory is the Albanese government’s top fiscal priority.
The program is forecast to hit “maturity” in 2044, at which point it would make up 2.4 per cent of GDP, compared to 0.9 per cent at present, making it roughly comparable to aged care in cost.
However, if the NDIS has not matured by this point, Treasury forecasts it will consume 3.2 per cent of GDP and government debt will be 40 per cent larger.
That is also assuming national cabinet’s NDIS sustainability framework is successful. Without the framework, which has not been finalised, the NDIS would cost more than 6 per cent of GDP in 2063, which is more than the health budget.
Revenue
Workers are expected to pay an increasing share of the total tax take over the next four decades due to structural change in the economy.
The shift towards electric vehicles means petrol excise revenue will collapse, while declining smoking rates will hit tobacco excise collection.
Indirect tax receipts excluding GST are expected to decrease to 1.4 per cent of GDP by 2063, down from the current rate of 2.2 per cent.
The decline could be even more rapid if Australians adopt EVs at an even more enthusiastic scale than predicted.
That means taxpayers will need to give up a bigger share of their income to fill the gap.
This will occur primarily via bracket creep, as increasing nominal wages pushes people into higher tax brackets, which are assumed to remain unchanged.
Personal income tax receipts are expected to hit 14.3 per cent of GDP by 2063, compared to 11.7 per cent at present.
Meanwhile, the number of people paying tax is expected to narrow due to the ageing of the population.
Only 12 per cent of Australians aged 70 and over pay income tax, and this group is expected to increase.
I forwarded Windschuttle’s article “Yunupingu: Lord of the Manor” to certain Lefties in my family tree….
Fewer workers to shoulder soaring income tax take
John Kehoe
Economics editor
Personal income tax will soar to an unprecedented almost 60 per cent of the overall federal tax base and be shouldered by a smaller share of working-age people unless there is “policy change”, the Intergenerational Report warns.
Amid a political debate over the $20 billion-a-year stage 3 personal income tax cuts due next year, the report exposes that without reform to the tax system, personal income tax will soar over the medium term from an-already record 50.5 per cent of tax receipts in 2022-23 to 58.4 per cent in 2062-63.
“In the absence of policy change, projections show increasing reliance on personal income tax,” according to the federal government report.
The IGR, an initiative of former treasurer Peter Costello in 2002, is a five-yearly update of the long-term estimates of structural budget pressures. After the last release two years ago by then treasurer Josh Frydenberg, his successor Jim Chalmers commissioned another to help provide a basis for reform measures.
The full report released on Thursday showed that more of the income tax burden will fall on a shrinking share of working-age people to support older Australians living longer and requiring aged care, healthcare and other social supports.
“As the population ages, the personal income tax base is projected to continue to narrow in line with the projected decline in workforce participation,” the IGR said.
Only 12 per cent of Australians aged 70 and over pay income tax and this age group now makes up 12.2 per cent of the total population.
The over 70 age group is expected to increase to 18.1 per cent of the population in 2062-63.
A shift from petrol and diesel vehicles to electric vehicles over the coming decades will cut the fuel excise tax base, while an expected decline in cigarette smoking rates will erode tobacco excise.
“Governments will need to understand the potential implications of these trends on the efficiency, equity and sustainability of the tax system when considering what policy responses would be most appropriate,” the IGR said.
Bracket creep will cause taxpayers to pay higher average tax rates as nominal wages increase.
“Increases in nominal wages result in increasing average personal tax rates over time as a higher proportion of an individual taxpayer’s income is paid at the highest marginal tax bracket applicable to them.
“Average personal tax rates fall when governments reduce personal income taxes.”
Revenue challenge
In a speech to the national press club, Treasurer Jim Chalmers acknowledged there was a “revenue challenge”.
“As we age, there will be a smaller share of working-age people – putting pressure on our tax base.”
“At the same time as we face growing spending pressures. From the NDIS, aged care, health, defence and debt interest costs. Which could keep us in deficit and put debt back on the rise.”
The report echoes repeated warnings from the OECD, International Monetary Fund and former Treasury secretary Ken Henry’s 2010 tax review that Australia taxes personal income and corporate profits heavily, and raises too little revenue from less economically damaging tax bases such as consumption and land.
Dr Chalmers said the latest analysis on the tax take was not a “policy outcome” of the Albanese government, but an assumption of the Treasury.
Treasury assumes that overall tax collections will drift slightly higher from a forecast 23.9 per cent of GDP in 2023-24 to 24.4 per cent by 2033-34, about $12 billion extra a year in today’s dollars.
“The level of taxation in Australia remains below the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) average,” the IGR noted.
Australia’s relatively low 10 per cent GST rate and absence of social security taxes in favour of compulsory superannuation make its overall tax burden relatively low.
Nevertheless, Australians pay more personal income tax as a share of government revenue than any other advanced economy, except for the high-taxing Scandinavian welfare state of Denmark, according to the OECD.
As a share of GDP, personal income tax receipts are forecast to rise from 11.7 per cent of GDP in 2022–23 to 13.5 per cent by 2033–34 and 14.3 per cent in 2062–63.
At various points in the future, governments would return bracket creep to taxpayers, Dr Chalmers said.
Asked if the government should shift the income tax burden from working-age people to asset-rich older Australians by taxing assets more, Dr Chalmers said the government had outlined its tax reform priorities and “that journey is not finished yet”.
Changes so far include higher taxes on superannuation accounts above $3 million, oil and gas producers, off-market share buybacks and capital raisings.
Nice to be one of the 12%
Dot
20 July 1944.
Zulu, the lass is voting “no”. She’s a lawyer, and finds the emotive “yes” case disturbing and racist. Garbage Law in a nutshell.
We don’t discuss politics much, and I know she’s a bit squishy on social justice. But this is a bridge too far.
Forty years of deficit as climate and ageing population ravage economy
Phillip Coorey – Political editor
The federal budget is set to fall back into deficit this financial year and stay that way for the next four decades, as an ageing population increases spending pressures, the tax base erodes, and climate change ravages traditional revenue sources while imposing extra costs on the economy.
The latest Intergenerational Report, released in full on Thursday by Treasurer Jim Chalmers, also shows that without remedial policy change and the seizing of new opportunities, the nation will stay mired in debt for the same period and beyond.
Gross debt, as a proportion of GDP, is forecast to drop from the current level of 39.3 per cent to 22.5 per cent by 2048-49, before taking off again to reach 32.1 per cent of GDP by 2062-63, the end of the Intergenerational Report’s 40-year forecast period.
By then, GDP, or the economy, will be 2½ times what it is now, or about $5 trillion.
In launching the report at the National Press Club, Dr Chalmers said that to buttress the economy for next 40 years, governments had to show the same policy vision as the Hawke/Keating government showed in the 1980s,which had enabled the economy to flourish over the past four decades.
“At this generational fork in the road we can shape the future on our terms,” he said.
“We can turn these turbulent ’20s into the right kind of defining decade, so that in 40 years’ time, our successors will be able to look back and see that we got it right, like we now look back on the 1980s.”
Dr Chalmers, however, was reluctant to propose anything bold, ruling out wholesale tax reform as being demanded by business groups and instead settling for more piecemeal tax hikes such as those announced so far on tobacco, superannuation, multinationals and the PRRT.
More broadly, he listed eight reform priorities to deal with the immediate and long-term challenges identified in the report.
These were easing the cost of living; exercising budget discipline; transforming the energy sector to a net-zero economy; developing a better-trained workforce; broadening and deepening the industrial base; leveraging capital and lifting investment; designing more efficient markets; and reforming institutions such as the Reserve Bank of Australia and the Productivity Commission.
The Intergenerational Report forecasts the population to reach 40.5 million by 2062-63, by when the number of people aged over 65 will have doubled, the number of those aged over 85 will be triple that of now, and there will be a six-fold increase in those aged over 100.
Population growth will be slower than originally forecast and Australia will be older due to the twin forces of increasing life expectancy and low fertility.
The report estimates total government spending will need to increase from 24.8 per cent today to 28.6 per cent within 40 years.
“Around 40 per cent of the projected increase in spending that’s outlined in the IGR is due to us getting older,” Dr Chalmers said.
Top five spending pressures
The five fastest-growing costs on the budget – the National Disability Insurance Scheme, interest payments in debt, defence, aged care and health – will between them cost $140 billion more a year in today’s dollars than they do now.
By 2062-63, the top five spending pressures will account for half of all Commonwealth spending, up from a third now.
And that’s assuming the target the government has set to rein in the unsustainable growth rate of the NDIS is achieved. Even then, it would cap out at $105 billion a year.
“The size and scope of the NDIS is larger than expected when the scheme commenced,” the Intergenerational Report said.
“There were 610,502 participants in the scheme as at 30 June 2023. This is 49 per cent more than the original Productivity Commission estimate of 411,000 participants at full roll-out in 2018–19.
“Total Australian government spending on the NDIS is projected to grow from 0.9 per cent of GDP in 2022–23 to 1.8 per cent by 2033–34. It is projected to be 2.1 per cent of GDP at maturity in 2043–44 and remain stable until 2062–63”
At the May budget, the government sought to rein in the explosive NDIS spending by pledging to reduce its growth rate from a rampant 14 per cent to a still high 8 per cent by 2026.
The government is also working on changes to aged care funding that will be announced at the end of the year and are likely to involve greater means testing and a more pronounced shift towards user pays.
The Intergenerational Report forecasts annual average growth to slow to 2.2 per cent over the next 40 years, which would be the lowest since World War II, and 0.9 percentage points lower than the average annual growth of the past 40 years.
“Slower economic growth will place pressure on the tax base at a time of rising costs, creating a long-term fiscal challenge,” it said.
“Governments will need to make choices about how they respond to these shifts in the economy and tax bases while maintaining sustainable public finances and funding essential services.”
An ageing population will cause a projected decline in workforce participation which means a lower personal income tax base. For example, only 12 per cent of Australians aged 70 and over pay income tax and this age group now makes up 12.2 per cent of the total population.
“This age group is expected to increase to 18.1 per cent of the total population in 2062-63,” the report said.
But overall, personal income tax receipts are projected to increase due to income and wages growth and continued population growth, meaning income tax receipts will continue to grow as a proportion of GDP unless governments continue to offer periodic tax cuts.
Decarbonisation disruption
Decarbonisation is a major threat to revenue given Australia has relied extensively for decades on the taxes gleaned from exports of such commodities as coal and gas.
“Global demand for bulk commodities, and therefore reliance on them as a source of company tax revenue, is also expected to fall,” the report said.
Thermal coal exports, worth $60 billion last year, will be reduced to 1 per cent of that in 40 years if the world limits global warming to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels. They will be cut by 50 per cent if the world caps the temperature rise to a more realistic 2 per cent.
The more immediate threat to revenue from decarbonisation is the loss of a net $14 billion a year in fuel excise from the shift to electric vehicles.
The government has shown no willingness to introduce a road user charge to replace the revenue.
The loss of tobacco excise will also create a hole as people give up smoking.
“Tax receipts from traditional sources such as fuel excise and tobacco excise are expected to decline over time,” the Intergenerational Report said.
“Indirect taxes (excluding GST) as a share of GDP are projected to decrease from 2.2 per cent in 2022–23 to 1.4 per cent in 2062–63, further extending the decline observed over the past 20 years.
“The decline reflects projected increases in the uptake of electric vehicles and a decline in per capita smoking rates. However, the rate at which these indirect tax bases erode is highly uncertain.”
At the same time, adapting to climate change creates lucrative opportunities for Australia given its rich source of critical minerals.
“While global demand shifts will cause some fossil fuel-intensive industries to decline, Australia is well positioned with renewable energy potential and abundant natural resources to capitalise on the net-zero transformation and broaden and grow Australian industry,” the report said.
It estimates that if the world is to achieve net-zero emissions by 2050, global demand for critical minerals will need to increase by about 350 per cent by 2040. The demand for lithium will be eight times what it is now.
“Lithium, cobalt, manganese and rare earth elements are crucial to battery manufacturing. Rare earth elements are also essential for permanent magnets used in wind turbines and electric vehicle motors,” it sa
126M Views
Sorry, but its hard to credit their failure to even reach the first line of defense with only “two photos of destroyed tanks and IFVs”.
Oh, it has.
We really don’t know yet.
Nuts.
It helped break the counteroffensive. That operation delayed and wore down a lot of Ukraine’s combat strength and provided time to Russian defensive efforts in the south.
For the umpteenth time dotty, Russia is not trying to occupy all of Ukraine. Russia already occupies the territory it wants in Ukraine. It is now in the process of defending that territory. Ukraine is shredding it’s manpower and resources attempting to dislodge Russia. Even NATO is now recognizing this with open talk of a settlement. It depends on what the classification is for a “win”. The way I see it, unless Ukraine can somehow force Russia to leave, Ukraine has failed in it’s objective- they have lost.
Unlike the USA.
Oh, wait.
(TL;DR Two years to supply the Ukies with 31 factory fresh M1A2s.
Less than 2 years to supply them with ResModded M1A1s.)
Do you have an official source for that assertion?
126M Views
Makka was my source re the Armatas.
That’s a legitimate answer but Russia lied, bullshitted and had other aims in the beginning. Obviously.
Bingo.
Err, it was joined and largely fought wellbefore the counteroffensive.
Sure, Russia has what, taken on only 5,000 casualties? Lunatic stuff being written up by the Kremlin press secretaries.
Windschuttle debunks the “First Nations” and “Sovereignty was never ceded” myths.
Cheap and effective.
How much is a crate of Blue Nun?
Watched the other half of the Carlson interview with Trump. Not as interesting as the first half, maybe only for me, possibly not for other more in-depth followers of what has happened to him. My feeling was that Trump raked over too many old coals and there wasn’t any real emphasis till the very end on what his future programs would look like. Maybe that’s for later, and at present he’s using 123 million eyeballs of the video to reinforce why he’s under attack and how he feels about that. A tendency to ramble a little though isn’t a good look for an eighty year old, and I must admit he did a bit of that. Hope he sharpens up later on. That said, down-home fireside style talks have worked for earlier Presidents, so maybe they will suit Trump’s appeal too.
Indeed. Never pretend to know the outcome while things are still in play.
Um, no. It was fought largely through Oct-May 2023. You don’t respawn the effort to defend Bakhmut. Further, recall, the counter-offensive was first slated for spring, not summer.
I don’t think for a minute they are that low. And its pointless countering obvious underestimates with overestimates.
Hey, JC, do you still have Qantas shares? It’s almost a licence to print money now that its only domestic competition is a pissant little 737 airline:
QANTAS GROUP POSTS FIRST FULL YEAR PROFIT SINCE COVID.
School Survey Questions Aussie Kids About Parents’ COVID Compliance
You must be talking about Joe Biden.
Trump killed it. 124 million people watched him, those other candidates really blew themselves up. He’s so far ahead and the others are on single digits.
Disobeying the authorities saved their lives
Dr. John Campbell
Myocarditis, don’t bother to report
No Tom, I sold the stuff around 2018 or 2019.
I sold because I thought that I had too much exposure to the airline business. I kept the Syd airport and sold Quaintarse. Now don’t have either.
Here’s some slanderous bullshit cope:
https://newrepublic.com/post/172682/ratings-no-one-really-watched-cnn-trump-town-hall
The Ratings Are In: No One Really Watched CNN’s Trump Town Hall
…CNN’s decision to host a town hall with twice-impeached, criminally indicted, convicted sexual abuser Donald Trump…
WHAT!?
Of course they are. They tried a 1968 style Czech coup de main and it didn’t work. They’ve been saying “we never meant it” ever since. It’s black comedy, like the kid in the room with the walls covered in chocolate cake saying it wasn’t me mummy!
Shoigu himself talked about reestablishing Soviet borders. Putin for example said Kazakhstan is not a real country. Some tanks were flying the Soviet flag as they invaded Ukraine (a bad look imo). And Putin wants to be Peter the Great. None of this has gone unnoticed by Russia’s neighbours.
Real danger that would be left in the hanger. Carton of Woodies?
Tom
The little Irish prick announced a buyback because he has a ton of stock options I reckon.
Best airline CEO in the world, but such a prick.
A plan to conquer Belarus by 2030 was leaked in February this year. It was amusing a couple weeks ago that that a band playing in Georgia invited a Russian on stage…and the audience walked out. Georgians know exactly what Russia wants: it wants Georgia. Russia has also been playing games in Moldova, whose people are not happy about it. This is not a civilized regime. At least the regime are. I have Russian friends, they’re great and Aussies and Russians get on famously I’ve found, but the KGB thugocracy in the Kremlin is exactly that.
JC, get back into QAN stock. It’s going to be a licence to print money for the foreseeable future as competition is bad for unions. Elbow is busy protecting the unions’ super monopoly.
Let me just park this here, again, before I leave for a while:
The Real History of the War in Ukraine
Aussie Cossack, a fan favourite of quite a few – is he still agitating for a ‘Kranian prisoner exchange so he can go and live back in Mother Russia?
Yes? No?
I don’t care, just asking.
Same can be said for the Fat Fascist Hunchback dictatorship.
Very, very sad that we have to start with this nonsense again.
New World Odor™
@hugh_mankind
Dr. Byram Bridle, Viral Immunologist & Vaccinologist, DEBUNKS the ability of masks to stop transmission with a simple experiment.
KGB thugocracy in the Kremlin is exactly that.
just like the US then except the people running the kremlin are actually pro their country unlike the toxic trash in DC.
Putin is also untrustworthy. He has just betrayed the agreement he signed with Wagner that was negotiated by Lukashenko. He refused to support Armenia in their defense against Azerbaijan in their recent war. The Azeris are literally starving the Armenians to death in Nagorno Karabakh right now, and Russia is doing nothing, despite a supposed formal treaty with Armenia. Not surprising that Armenia isn’t exactly happy with Russia right now.
Then there’re all the exotic assassination attempts, some successful, using dioxin, polonium, novichok and whatnot. Classic KGB. Is it any wonder that people fear Russia and Mr Putin?
That’s not to say Ukraine is a decent place. It isn’t and their regime is miserably corrupt and fascist. If Russia wasn’t invading the place NATO might have.
I’m bemused by righties who think Vlad the Poisoner is the bee’s knees. I believe it is because it’s a reaction to the Left supporting Ukraine. I detest the Left, but baddies vs baddies is a very appropriate way of thinking about this wretched mess. Interesting that Tony Abbott said that about Syria, which Russia has also been playing in. Wagner especially have left quite a trail of blood in that country ’tis said.
Quenthland news (the Courier-Mail):
Waikarie Molly was later observed mowing the grandstand’s roof.
Which is why we should stay right out of it
Sky’s coverage of the AEC outrage was Abbottesque.
Which is most viscious insult that I can contrive after ‘Irish faggott airline guy Sleasy corruptor beloved by Dot’.
PS. Not Bolt surprisingly.
I just finished watching Tucker Carlson’s interview with Trump and checked the count – it stood at 132 million views. That is more than half of all adults in the US. Of course, quite a few million views will be international like myself but that is a phenomenal count for a few hours.
Yep. I wouldn’t say the regime in DC aren’t pro their country, just that they want a nation which conforms to their ideology. It puts them about 20 or 30 years behind Putin.
There is an amusing story today about Putin cancelling a election for governor in the Republic of Khakassia. Sergei Sokol is the United Russia Party candidate and it’s looking like the communist incumbent is going to win. Can’t have that.
Avi Yemeni & Rukshan Fernando absolutely destroyed the RMIT & Face Book “Fact Checkers”.
Avi & Ezra Levant
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6lCFkuck-TE
I wouldn’t say the regime in DC aren’t pro their country
I would – at war with their own people just like the trash in canbra
With political prisoners, ill treated ones at that. Just like the USSR.
Who knew Neville Bartos was literally a (meth) cooker?
Show trials too.
A good way to remind yourself of the way the war unfolded last year:
..
Battle for Kiev:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ov10MD3HFao
Enough time has elapsed for the entire initial campaign to be documented. It’s absolutely astonishing. I urge folks to watch. Footage of aftermath of battles interspersed with analysis, maps and blow by blow, day by day narrative.
..
Bruce, the lefties are having exactly the same crisis over Ukraine as is racking the right. They are stuck with the aftermath of decades of rhetoric about the U.S. being the great Satan and opposing every American “imperialist” endeavour from Vietnam to Afghanistan. People may remember a certain poster on here who used to squawk “Septic tanks” on a daily basis. People on here used to oppose that garbage.
Then we have Hilary crying wolf over Russiagate for years after previously handing Putin a big, red reset button. Not a lot of consistency from anyone.
No it isn’t. Why do they do it?
I was a great admirer of the US until the events of the last 4 years unfolded. I just had no idea how corrupt it was and I don’t think Trump did either.
.
Yep. Just like the USSR and the KGB. Navalny, Trump, Poroshenko. Oh wait the last one is a Ukie. Always difficult to tell fascist regimes apart, except when they fight each other.
Anyway I will take it all back if Trump is allowed to win and he cleans up DC or better still shut the whole place down.
Andrew Bolt likes Mike Pence’s performance at the debate. Click, change channel. I’m finding it hard to watch his program just like I do with Chris Kenny.
Sky after dark is not what it used to be, I have to wait until 10 pm to watch the Late Debate for some decent discussion.
Not going to happen. The fix is in. The only question is whether the Dems overstep.
Farage: Jailing Donald Trump Could Lead to a ‘Civil War-Like Split’ in America (23 Aug)
Makes me think Nigel has read Kurt Schlichter’s novels. They keep on coming true. Wildfire especially creeped me out.
The AI is improving. There are very few flaws except in lighting and shadow. The only real problem is “her” thumbs are really long.
https://www.instagram.com/millasofiafin/
Also if you don’t know live video and audio can be edited in real time.
Good luck proving anything is real or not, or ever happened anymore.
Andrew Bolt likes Mike Pence’s performance at the debate.
Oh Lord.
I hope you’re not paying good money to have that sludge piped into your house
Jeez you’d almost think Bolt was controlled opposition like Bernadi
Thanks for the bomber story Bruce – put it on my Facebook page with a credit to you.
Got a small cheque back from the NSW RMS for a surrendered registration of a motor vehicle.
$250 back
$31 fee
FFS!
“Hey guys, I know registration with the admin fee and motor vehicle tax is $550, but I’m only going to pay $470 as I have processing and handling overheads I need to cover!”
Yes. That’s the most lively thing on these days and more fun than the others.
Did you ever get to CPAC, Crossie, where you could have chatted to James McPherson? He is as nice in the flesh as he is on TV, nicer even, so unassuming and friendly. I thought he was impressive last night against the flaming feminism of Liz Storer, a fascinating female firestorm, who is yet young. She tried to make her mark last nite but missed it badly. Mostly, she is far more on point.
Oh, and ‘temper’ or ‘tamper’, ‘on point’ or ‘en pointe‘, what a lot of choices English usage (with a little French borrowing) gives, with such fine shades of meaning. You can temper something as you tamp it, and you can tamper with something to temper it. Strange to me how it such things can put some into a temper.
I’d suggest going with the flow on a fast moving blog. 🙂
Err
$250 owed to me
$31 fee
$219 cheque made out to me
They literally did three minutes of work talking to me in the Service NSW shop front.
Imagine what a NSW Health employed radiologist is charged out per hour at then if a customer service officer is theoretically charged out at $620 per hour.
Rubbish Bruce. The hard facts are that despite US/NATO/EU huge backing, Russia has won it’s territorial objectives and making Ukraine pay a horrible price to change the on ground status. This is shaping up as a monumental failure for Biden, Nuland and the despicable USG hawks. After the imposition of unprecedented restrictions/sanctions on Russia and the Billions in cash, materiel sent, the enormous Intel assistance, training and other support for Ukraine, still Ukraine isn’t making any progress in gaining any territory. A complete PR disaster for the West.
For those interested, this is a great doco series from Adam Curtis that details the collapse of communism in the old USSR. This shows what Russians endured and went through not so long ago. It puts into context the Russians traumatic experience of ending communism. Given how hypocritical the west has been about “democracy” and “freedom”, you can understand their mistrust of our “values”.
Link:
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt22059224/
Goodes’ claim at a Qantas Voice event that his ‘mother was part of the flora and fauna act when she was born’ is a myth
Even in the middle of the Voice debate, activists including ex Australian of the Year Adam Goodes are uttering untruths about Indigenous people once being covered by a “flora and fauna act”.
Rita Panahi
Once again ‘yes’ advocates have been caught spreading dangerous and divisive disinformation; this time the lie was so brazen that the pro-Voice ABC had to issue a correction.
Former AFL star Adam Goodes – a man given the honour of being named Australian of the Year in 2014 before telling his fellow countrymen “remember whose lands you are on” and smearing footy fans as racists for booing him – claimed at a Qantas ‘yes’ event that his “mother was part of the flora and fauna act when she was born”.
On Friday the ABC issued the following correction under the headline “Flora and Fauna Myth”.
“The Drum: On August 14 the program included a news clip of Adam Goodes stating that stated (sic) Indigenous people were once governed by the flora and fauna act. This is inaccurate – Indigenous people in Australia have never been covered by a flora and fauna act.”
It is remarkable that in 2023, in the midst of a national debate about constitutional change we are still having this ugly untruth uttered, often by activists who should know better and that includes Goodes.
Five years ago I wrote about this urban myth that has been repeated time and time again by politicians and a host of moral posturing sporting stars and celebrities including ABC host Charlie Pickering and actor Aaron Pedersen.
The ABC itself did a fact check debunking the flora and fauna lie.
Shamefully, the Minister for Indigenous Australians Linda Burney is guilty of repeating this myth, and more than once.
It’s not a harmless lie; it’s one designed to shame the country and its history and to push further grievance and division along racial lines.
Earlier this month, a key architect of the Voice, academic and activist Marcia Langton wrote about the public square being “flooded with egregious lies about the referendum proposal.”
What she failed to mention is that many of those lies come from the ‘yes’ camp and not just from random social media trolls with six followers but from prominent people with a significant voice.
Herald-Sun
Indolent
Thanks for posting that, Indolent.
School Survey Questions Aussie Kids About Parents’ COVID Compliance
The bastards have been caught out getting children to spy on their parents – straight out of the 1984 Instruction Manual.
No Lizzie, there were important family events happening last weekend, both days, but I am hoping I will be free to attend next year. I was able to watch some of the speeches online though I missed out on the ones I really wanted to see. I see that ADH TV has them up on their app so I will play them when I have some free time. Tomorrow and this weekend are more family things so hopefully next week.
5:86 – 265 mph!
Spiderman runs amok.
—-
CycleDrag:
Top Fuel Motorcycle world record holder Larry “Spiderman” McBride broke another performance mark, the time the track record at Heartland Motorsports Park in Topeka, KS with a pass of 265 mph in extreme heat on his Top Fuel Bike “Star.” We catch up with McBride after his record run to talk some motorcycle drag racing and tease some big news coming for his program as well as send condolences to a Top Fuel Bike team in England who experienced some Top Fuel Motorcycle gone wrong, suffering an unfortunate drag racing crash
You have to be INSANE to go THIS FAST on two wheels!
In the good old days it would have been playing for West Coast.
Almost as bad as the Holodomor eh?
The rest of the Warsaw Pact was happy about it and still are.
On Friday the ABC issued the following correction under the headline “Flora and Fauna Myth”.
“The Drum: On August 14 the program included a news clip of Adam Goodes stating that stated (sic) Indigenous people were once governed by the flora and fauna act. This is inaccurate – Indigenous people in Australia have never been covered by a flora and fauna act.”
Wow hats off to the ABC for a change
Nearly HALF of the US population have watched Tucker interview the great man.
Watch it and be informed. What a dumb comment.
If anything it’s the west that is employing Stalinist tactics these days like getting kids to spy and report on their patents. Neighbors encouraged to dob in covid non-conformity. Media compliance studiously non-reporting the Biden Crime Family. Get a fkg grip.
Agree 100% Makka- quite pathetic the way some here try to kid themselves the US in 2023 is a force for good.
Of course , so were the Russian people and rightly so.
..
No one here disagrees with that.
Keeping repeating it over and over isn’t getting us anywhere because you are preaching to the choir, but it’s completely irrelevant to the outcome of the war in Ukraine.
But here’s a question: Do you think the Russians conducting information campaigns might have glommed onto these facts to drive further wedges into us?
I mean, they did it among the left in the Erst for decades. Do you think it’s possible they have now moved their attention to the right?
West
The simple truth.
LOL. Maybe you should read some history rather than just watching videos.
I have read a fair bit of Russian history. I like Russians. I’ve worked with several. Russian regimes, now, are a different fish entirely though. Maybe Vlad should’ve read upon Vyacheslav von Plehve’s “short victorious war” before embarking on this fiasco.
miltonf
Aug 24, 2023 8:32 PM
Notice they refused to say there was never a “Flora and Fauna Act”, Milton. They can now bring the lie out again.
including the wiring and drains ?
sancho, you are so full of shit it’s brimming over
If it’s an accurate video it’s probably just as good as reading some history.
No more than the US/CIA has been doing for the last 30 years.
Here’s the thing- I hold the west -especially the Anglo west- to a much higher standard that the likes of Russia and certainly China. What I’ve learned since 2020 is that these Govts are all of a kind. Totally and completely untrustworthy, where no act is too low in order to defend and grow their control and oppression over us. I’m despising them all, equally.
Interesting job interview today with the worlds most unlucky company.
Have vast tenements, good production, in an unusual move they send their gold bearing ore/concentrate to a 2nd country for processing while they firm up their reserves and coin cash to expand further.
Works great, until about…. 2 years ago.
They were exporting to Russia.
Instaban on exports cripples them, then the sea container shortage gives them a new financial wedgie and they go into administration.
Just come out of administration, huge amount of very good ground (including pits and underground workings) in care and maintenance, they have a small processing plant now and are either going to crawl back to reopening everything, or be brought out.
Curse you Vladimir!
I find it disgusting that the Minister has made this claim in both State and Federal Parliaments, and had never been censured, or called to account.
why would you wire a roof without the walls under it
dunno
prolly derivative
everyone knows you wait till the control panel switches are in
and the waterproofing done
those mongs
I see BoN is now an expert on Russian military history.
What’s that saying? Someone who feigns expertise on everything yet knows nothing.
..
The actions of Vicpol during the lockdowns while I could not drive more than 5Km from home and were under curfew for months left me feeling the same.
The election shenanigans and the “get Trump at any cost” lies over Russiagate and the Capitol protest added fuel.
At the end of the whole thing I thought and said to others “why did I ever put my hand up to serve this country? I was an idiot to do so”.
My anger has resided. And I don’t think it was ever a justification for denying Ikrainian efforts to free themselves, even if they use that freedom to make the same mistakes we have.
No shit Sherlock. I lived there for a couple years in the 2000’s. And yes, read a few books on Russian history too. It is very different now but in ways you may not think.
Isn’t there footage somewhere of Bill Shorten repeating the old myth about poised waterholes?
poisoned waterholes, FFS!
There’s book experience, and there’s lived experience. I’ll take lived every day.
I plan to read Beevor’s book on the Russian Civil War, but that will in no way allow me to comment with authority on it.
One of the nice histories I read was of a Scottish doctor who was accredited by Peter the Great to the court of the Emperor of China. He was treated appallingly by the Chinese. This was not long after the Russians tried one on China by building a fort on the Amur, which was in the Chinese backyard. The Chinese finally evicted the Russians and erased the fort after nearly 50 years of on and off fighting. That was in 1689. Relations between Russia and her neighbours have not changed much for nearly 400 years.
Relatively. I do read stuff. I think Russia is a fascinating country, since Kievan Rus times. Plus the Viking influence. The very fact that Tsar/Czar is a derivative of “Caesar” is very interesting and says a lot about the history. The T-34 is my favourite tank of all time. Amazing beast.
Classics!
Ronald Lee Ermey was brilliant. I think he came up with everything said on the spot?
Full Metal Jacket – Gunnery Sergeant Hartman
“Relatively. “
No, you’re not an expert.
I’m not an expert on some places. Or some fields. Don’t ask me about architecture, art or poetry. I haven’t read anything much on China or Japan for example. Or Siam. I have a book on my to read pile here in my office, it’s The Chinese Opium Wars by Jack Beeching. Must get around to reading it. Also need to read more Greek and Roman historians, I have several in the other pile including Appian and Suetonius, whose stuff I haven’t read yet.
Yes dear.
KD, I drove past the “roof on the ground” project every day.
Couldn’t believe how quick it went up.
I reckon the only people who were pissed off were:-
– roof plumbers missing out on work at height allowances;
– nosy worksafe inspectors;
– old catweazle types who confidently predicted it would never work.
KD, tbh it sounds like a bit of a Lego factory
you know, if you pretend the crane is just right and that you’re really really accurate you could just hoik the whole thing up and pop the top on.
if you were really accurate, all the storm-water wastes would key together … pre-glued I suppose
then after that amazing feat, you clowns could run around inside the Lego factory and get busy making even more Lego factories.
on a serious note … without sounding too stupid KD, could you give us all some sort of idea of the size of sancho’s imaginary factory?
was one crane enough?
how tall was it?
Can’t be many, surely.
I don’t think it was ever a justification for denying Ikrainian efforts to free themselves, even if they use that freedom to make the same mistakes we have.
very twee- the whole mess in the Ukraine is a result of US meddling since 2014 maybe earlier
If your well read it usually shows without having to tell people you’re well read. Similar to what Mrs T said about being a lady iirc.
Poor Russia. They had to invade.
Like Dr Frank N Furter. “It was a mercy killing!”.
Pretty much yeah
The US was essentially attacking Russia thru its puppets in the Ukraine
oh sancho’s actually here.
did the roof have a plug and socket arrangement to connect with the stuff that matters?
yr gonna have to give more detail lest everybody thinks yr full of it
Full Metal Jacket. The entire movie was filmed within the city of London (UK).
With that nugget in mind, it is quite fun to watch it again. 🙂
By ‘everybody’ I think you mean just you, don’t you?
not givin’ up the patents for nafink
do ya own research
derivative mong
how many factories have you seen built that way sancho?
just wondering
Russia undermined Ukraine for years and then started invading territories shortly after its own puppet (who had been caught red-handed rigging Parliamentary votes) was ousted.
“Being powerful is like being a lady. If you have to tell people you are, you aren’t.” ? Margaret Thatcher
Even when they’re meant to be in and around the outskirts of Hue? That’s actually pretty impressive.
Crikey! Not sure I’d be able to write 150 insults.
dotty, of course Russia is not an innocent actor in this. In fact Putin’s Govt is an insidious regime. But NATO and the US figured they could take Russia on safely by using Ukraine as their pawn to provoke them into a losing conflict. It’s failing spectacularly but Ukraine is paying the terrible price for sleeping with snakes like Biden. The whole situation is obscene.
The current regime in the Ukraine, antagonistic to Russia, was installed by the US state department.
Some here can never again cast aspersions on Jane Fonda, or condemn whoever sold atomic secrets to the Soviets, or speak ill of Guy Burgess, Kim Philby etc.
After all, their support for foreign powers couldn’t have been inherently wrong.
Their only sin apparently was that they were of the wrong brand of politics.
And that guy who led the Persians around the back way to the hot gates, well, fully justified if he thought the system was corrupt.
I could, easy
Yep. Amongst other things Kubrick apparently had 100,000 palm trees flown in & plonked them in a park or botanical garden, or something, along the lower Thames.
There’s a website – google will be your friend – that goes right through all the ways Kubrick turned parts of London into Parris Island & Vietnam, mostly using existing buildings & scenery.
Wasn’t part of it shot in a former gas works?
I think it’s fun that people criticize me for putting up history links and political analysis without them ever replying in kind. In the last couple hours I’ve talked about the Russo-Japanese War, the siege of Albazin, Peter the Great from his own ambassador’s perspective and the Holodomor. And supplied numerous links for people to read too. Yet no one has bothered to discuss any of that. Sheesh.
This is a lie, and a pretty stupid one at that.
Some here can never again cast aspersions on Jane Fonda, or condemn whoever sold atomic secrets to the Soviets, or speak ill of Guy Burgess, Kim Philby etc.
After all, their support for foreign powers couldn’t have been inherently wrong.
The US is a foreign power meddling in eastern Europe- look what they’re up to in Hungary.
Geez Arky you kill-joy
you’re taking ethics and it’s spoiling the construction techniques deep-dive
Some here can never again cast aspersions on Jane Fonda, or condemn whoever sold atomic secrets to the Soviets, or speak ill of Guy Burgess, Kim Philby etc.
why not?
..
The US is an ally.
This is a lie, and a pretty stupid one at that.
oh really?
Well, it’s easy when you have so many directed at you I guess.
BTW, repeating “mong” 150 times is not 150 insults.
It is just the one.
Here you go Dot: Full Metal Jacket filming locations.
(Okay, not all were withing the limits of the London metro area, but it was Olde Englande being presented as Parris Island, Vietnam jungle & Hue city ruins.
If only there were someone frequenting the Cat whose expertise was profanity & insults.
The US is an ally.
pathetic- it’s not 1984 any more. The US is gender fluidity and critical race theory now.
..
I’ve done worse.
you should read back the forum for a couple of months.
also … let KD know that it isn’t cool any more.
Fair call.
..
Yeah, give up on the culture wars and learn Russian. We’re assured it’s a great place now.
Defeatism is such a good tactic too.
What else do you give up on so easy?
Hopefully nothing more important than the place all us idiots still have to live and it’s biggest ally.
Yes.
You are saying the CIA took over the Ukrainian security apparatus before they installed Zelelsnky, then rigged a multi-candidate election where he came in the top two of three main contenders then rigged his second election (runoff), both of which were unexpected and had popular support; the CIA also bought/paid off/held under duress the Ukrainian pollsters too (along with the security agencies and electoral office in Ukraine).
Dear god this is unbelievably silly.
At that point, why even bother with elections if you did a coup before anyway? If good old Russia can figure this out, there’s no point in hiding it. How many people do you think work for the CIA? 400,000? The amount of people needed to keep this absurdity going and get it off the ground would be absurd. Presumably, most of them would have to be able to speak, read and write in Ukrainian and Russian.
It’s a good edit.
The Beauty Of Full Metal Jacket
The US is an ally.
And also they are spying on all Australian citizens through 5 Eyes. That’s the ally we have fallen in with. Not that we have much choice I admit but we should be real about the true costs of this alliance.
Very cool, Imam Sal.
Not really, it is more to screw over Americans than anything else.
We spy on their citizens for them and they look at that. It’s so the CIA can spy on Americans (which is normally illegal). It’s horrible.
hey sancho, just so you don’t seem like a tosser again … where were the factories you saw built that way?
coords?
I really wanna know
and the magnitude … i wanna know that too … were these mega-factories or just like factory factories?
how many actually were there?
Dot: Wikipedia’s page for Full Metal Jacket actually has a pretty good section on the English filming locations.
I think it’s fun that people criticize me for putting up history links and political analysis without them ever replying in kind.
Maybe, but they are at least reading your stuff Bruce!
The illusion of a “democracy”.
Just like what has happened in the US. Are you on drugs or just being diligently naive.?
Meanwhile in Montenegro
The more one travels around Europe, the more it seems to be morphing into a map of the continent pre-1914. Take Montenegro, for example, where we were the other day. The entire population of the country is about 500,000 – about the same as Tasmania, or Geelong, but much less than the population of Sydney or Melbourne. Montenegro is a very new country, having only broken away from Yugoslavia in 2006.
All of these tiny countries have their own “official language” too – but the languages are just a dialect or variation of the common one – rather like Australian-English, or American-English. Our guide told us jokingly he spoke six languages.
Montenegro a land of very steep mini-mountains, with the towns almost in a fjord-like setting, although it’s not a glacial creation, but rather formed by tectonics and earthquakes. Tourism is the main income producer of the future. Mrs TE went on a tour of a farm, and I went to the “old town” and a maritime museum.
The Kotor harbour was very beautiful sail out – and difficult because of sharp turns. The local pilot got applause when he hopped off the ship after 17 miles. A very beautiful place and worth a visit.
Not really,
So our guys are white hats and don’t bother looking at the intel?
You aren’t that silly.
by gawd yr a stupid man
can you even hear the gibber coming off yr own keyboard?
Kotor looks great, TE.
Didn’t make it there when we were in that part of the world.
I meant to say the other day that Plitvice Lakes in Croatia is worth a visit, but it is a fair hike from Split (or Zagreb to the North) and you can’t go everywhere.
An Arizona labor spat signals challenges for U.S. chip manufacturing.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. is investing $40 billion in two Phoenix chip factories. The company is expected to seek up to $15 billion in tax credits and grants under the Chips Act, which aims to reduce U.S. reliance on imported chips and boost domestic manufacturing. But TSMC said it plans to bring in skilled workers from Taiwan to address a shortage that has slowed construction, which drew a sharp rebuke from trade unions.
From the WSJ.
As soon as the US is no longer dependent on Taiwan they will not give a shit about the place.
Did I mention I got 8/8 on an online GMAT mini quiz?
The numerical stuff is dead easy.
The verbal reasoning is a bit convoluted, but once you know what they are looking for, it is pretty rote.
..
Well done.
Did I mention I got 8/8 on an online GMAT mini quiz?
That’s nothing.
Earlier this week I got 2/10 in the daily quiz in the Oz.
Something worth noting for the rest of us in the region.
Had an amusing conversation with Mrs Speedbox when she came home tonight:
Me: Hear about Prigozhin?
Mrs Speedbox: Da.
Me: What do you think happened?
Mrs Speedbox: Mechanical failure.
Me: Really?! Mechanical failure?!
Mrs Speedbox: Fuel leak.
Me: Uh huh. Sure about that?
Mrs Speedbox: Prove otherwise.
Me: Time will tell.
Mrs Speedbox: That Wagner thing a couple of months ago embarrassed Putin and Russia. Prigozhin didn’t just prod the bear, he slapped it. There was only one way this was going to go. Anyway, it was a fuel leak.
I once scored 11/33 in the review quiz in the Weekend Oz.
I don’t do the daily one, but do the weekend one.
Jeez, they dredge up some obscure shit.
The protest flag usually goes up over the wording of at least one question.
And, FFS, no-one remembers Oscar/Grammy/BAFTA winners much less nominees from thirty years ago.
I consider it a mark of honour not to know that shit.
ASIO doesn’t need to break the law to spy on Australians; whereas the CIA spying on US citizens is illegal.
GMAT verbal reasoning.
They give a very long convoluted sentence with an underlined phrase in the middle, and ask the candidate to choose the “best” phrase from that one and four others.
One usually conveys a completely different meaning (bzzzt) and the others have various levels of clumsiness.
The truth is, almost invariably the best answer (not available for selection) was to chop the whole word salad into two shorter clearer sentences.
Mark Dice:
The Republican Debate Clown Show!
Right. Now tell us how many Ukrainian speaking operatives they needed to have as boots on the ground to achieve that goal?
Fuel leak.
Hmmm.
Well, yes, I guess fuel does leak when a missile warhead detonates five metres from the aircraft, or a Louis Vuitton full of Semtex does it’s thing in the baggage compartment.
Probably not the root cause, but.
A bit like describing JFKs incident in Dallas as a “spontaneous cerebral haemorrhage”.
Upticks +++ Mega Upticks.
Only enough to carry and distribute the hundreds of millions in $’s to make it happen. And Russian speakers would do just as well.
Free and fair elections in Ukraine; you really are slurping up the kool aid dotty.