Saw the oncologist yesterday and best news I could have got under the circumstances .. so fairly happy ..!
PET results in & Cancer is in the early stages, hasn’t spread and benign, at the moment and cos the Prostate is on it’s last legs he agrees with the urologist that my best option is a double whammy .. both out at the same time ..
My choice, of course, but as I was hoping for the non-spread result to deal with it all at once .. Great! ..
would have preferred to be without either problem but ……. duuuuuuh! ….
Also if I come thru it I am, apparently, joining a unique club I’d rather not have been eligible for …… surviving two different types of Cancer …..
Urologist next Tuesday and then, hopefully, the next step getz a date ..!

…the Tories will find themselves ‘obliterated’ into dust.

To be replaced by something much worse.

One of Starmer’s key policies is to revoke tax exemptions on private schools (i.e. mostly independent Christian schools) and apply the 20% VAT to school fees.

Meanwhile, Britian’s peak Muslim lobby has issued an election manifesto calling for increased funding for their schools.

Keep an eye on what eventuates.

Bring ’em in from anywhwere .. ya knoze they’ll adapt/asimulate/become dinki di Oz .. ?cos “our” gummint tellz ya sooo! .. LOL!

?https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13574891/Husband-abandons-wife-overseas-argument-MUM.html

Mmm…I’ll just leave this here:

Australians should celebrate the return of Assange

Gabriël A Moens AM and Augusto Zimmermann

The Spectator Australia 28 June 2024

The return of Julian Assange to Australia has undoubtedly been the dominant news item during the last couple of days. In the pages of The Spectator Australia, Alexandra Marshall repeatedly intimated that the Assange matter has divided Australia’s conservatives. Commenting on her opinion, we have contributed a piece in which we argue that this matter should not divide conservatives because Assange’s release is a victory for freedom of speech and freedom of the press, and more importantly, is instrumental in reminding people of the dangers posed by uncontrolled governmental power to embark on secret and dangerous missions.

Following Assange’s return to Australia, Terry Barnes, in a brutal article in this publication, lambasted Assange’s release from prison in which he refers to him as a ‘convicted spy’. Relevantly, he contends that, ‘For every Australian politician, journalist and activist who hail Assange as a hero of press freedom and a shiner of light on the less savoury doings of Western governments, militaries, and security services, there are many more who shudder with revulsion at the very thought of him and his actions.’ In support of his view, he quotes frontbench opposition MP, Jane Hume, who demonised Assange for recklessly releasing ‘information that put counterintelligence and intelligence communities at risk’. In short, Barnes is clearly of the view that Assange is a disgrace to Australia and a criminal convicted of a felony. As an aside, he also criticises the Albanese government for chartering a private plane to bring Assange back to Australia, accompanied by the former Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd, and the High Commissioner of Australia to the United Kingdom, Stephen Smith.

We are convinced, however, that many conservatives will not appreciate Barnes’ article. But others, of course, will welcome it as an accurate assessment of the sort of ‘criminal activity’ which needs to be punished appropriately.

In vilifying the release of Assange, commentators appear to not really understand the dangers that governments pose to freedom of speech. Of course, it is not exceptional that a commonly used concept is misunderstood by a great number of people. One of the reasons for the existence of this phenomenon lies in the reluctance on the part of people to critically examine the consequences of the dilution of certain fundamental freedoms. Despite the voluminous nature of the relevant literature, few attempts have been made to stress the importance of freedom of speech for a healthy society based on the ideal of legality known as ‘the rule of law’. Dinesh D’Souza put it well when he said that a society ‘that was once dedicated to maximum freedom of mind and conscience now finds itself struggling to guarantee the minimum freedom insisted on by the law’. Although his comments specifically deal with the demonising of free speech on university campuses, his comments could easily be extrapolated to society as a whole.

Free speech implies one’s ability to express opinions without fear of reprisal. The ancient Greeks believed that only slaves could not speak freely. Ever since, free speech has been historically acknowledged as a fundamental right of every free individual, which works as a mechanism to avoid the concentration of power in the hands of a few. Of course, members of the ruling elite, including those working in intelligence gathering, have a personal stake in preserving the benefits associated with their status. These privileged individuals may attempt to do so by suppressing the manifestation of any reasonable political dissent and, accordingly, by resisting the publication of ‘sensitive’ or ‘incriminating’ materials, which are deemed to be detrimental to their accumulation of more power and control. In short, they may aspire to suppress any speech or the release of information that might be construed as a threat to their hegemonic power.

Since the exercise of free speech naturally threatens the established order, as it risks exposing the agenda of certain privileged groups, the focus of authorities may not be necessarily on protecting the speech of everyone but only that of a few selected individuals, or powerful bureaucracies. It is not difficult, therefore, to understand why the ruling elite may desire to reduce any threat to the dominating discourse. Free speech may cause embarrassment to such privileged groups when any particular agenda is advanced that is objectively contrary to the best interests of society at large. To preserve their vested interests, the ruling elite may be tempted to abrogate free speech. This temptation is motivated, not by a desire to improve our social condition, or to advance the common good, but to obtain undue advantages and consolidate the power of those who control the official narrative.

A truly democratic society is the one which necessarily acknowledges the concept of popular sovereignty. To exercise their sovereign power, Australians must be free to communicate about government and political matters and to expose any governmental shenanigans, fully and frankly. Accordingly, no Australian Parliament should ever be constitutionally authorised to introduce any legislation, including espionage legislation, which prevents the sovereign people of Australia from freely expressing their political views and to publish their findings, as this is just not compatible with the value of a democratic society of free individuals.

Returning to the Assange matter, he is the co-founder of WikiLeaks, which was awarded the Walkley Award for Most Outstanding Contribution to Journalism in 2011, an annual prize to reward excellence in Australian journalism, in recognition of the impact of WikiLeaks’ actions on public interest journalism by assisting whistle-blowers to tell their stories. His legal battle began in 2010, when WikiLeaks disclosed confidential military files from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, including a video of a 2007 Apache helicopter attack by American forces in Iraq that killed 11 innocent civilians, including two Reuters journalists. As admitted by the United States, not a single life has been lost because of the release of the now notorious documents published by Wikileaks.

Assange released via WikiLeaks 391,832 documents, incriminating America’s involvement in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, on the internet. As mentioned above, this included abuses by American soldiers and a video of an American helicopter attack in Iraq on suspected militants, who were unarmed civilians and journalists. The files, posted to the internet, were acquired by Chelsea Manning, an Army private, and handed over to WikiLeaks. Manning served seven years in jail but granted amnesty by President Barack Obama in 2017. Yet, the WikiLeaks’s publisher, Julian Assange, who himself did not appropriate these documents, remained languishing in jail.

What is particularly important to consider is that, thus far, no one has suggested that the authorities in the United States had a duty to ensure that their secret and sensitive information was securely stored. In not securing the information, the authorities in effect committed a transgression themselves by inviting more competent investigative journalists and publishers (and yes, also, thieves) to obtain the information for the purpose of exposing crimes committed by the government.

It is quite important here to remind our readers about his awful ordeal. Assange first fled to the Ecuadorean Embassy in June 2012 to avoid capture and extradition to Sweden where he had been accused of sexual assault – a charge since dropped by the Swedish authorities. Assange was evicted from the Embassy in April 2019, and he was then held in the UK’s notorious Belmarsh prison, fighting extradition to the United States where he could have spent up to 175 years in jail for computer hacking and espionage. During the extradition hearings, representatives of the United States argued that the publication of the documents endangered the lives of people, especially those who collaborated with the American military.

For years, people across the globe called for Assange to be returned to his native country Australia. Detained for the past eleven years in the UK, psychologically damaged and isolated in a maximum-security jail for the past two-and-a-half years, it is quite clear that Assange suffered enough. His quest to be released was constantly in the news, thereby reminding people of the importance of free speech in the maintenance of a free, democratic society. Of course, US prosecution of Julian Assange on espionage charges for acts of journalism intensified the chilling effect on global media, leading journalists to self-censor from fear of prosecution.

If there is one thing these last four years have taught us is that we should never trust government authorities to hide information from the public. In Australia, and elsewhere, we have already embarked on this perilous journey with the adoption of anti-vilification legislation, hate speech legislation, disinformation and misinformation laws, laws penalising even prayer in the vicinity of abortion clinics, banning any criticism of prohibition of conversion legislation, ostracising religious expression in the public forum, and so on. The list is endless.

Terry Barnes undoubtedly is correct to assume that, like the Hon Jane Human MP, many Australians will be ‘revolted’ by Julian Assange’s return. As for us, we proudly stand for freedom and celebrate Assange’s return. Indeed, we strongly believe that it was entirely appropriate for the US government to drop all these charges against Assange and allow him to return to Australia. We can only hope that the controversy about his release will become a constant reminder of the need to protect whistle-blowers, willing to disclose corruption and dastardly dealings in society.

Gabriël A. Moens AM is an emeritus professor of law at the University of Queensland and served as pro vice-chancellor and dean at Murdoch University.

Augusto Zimmermann is professor and head of law at Sheridan Institute of Higher Education and served as associate dean at Murdoch University. He is also a former commissioner with the Law Reform Commission of Western Australia.

We dance on’: Emotional photos show survivors of October 7 massacre meeting up at Tel Aviv festival for the first time

• Survivors of the Nova Festival met up at a concert for the first time
• The We Will Dance Again concert was help in Tel Aviv’s Yarkon Park 
• Hamas killed 364 people at the Nova Festival on October 7

Daily Mail.

I expect that the outcome of the Presidential debate will be that Biden supporters will claim he won (and, doubtless, the MSM), and Trump supporters will claim he won.

I don’t think anyone is actually a Biden supporter, they are just implacably opposed to Trump and Biden is not-Trump. Well, there is a small class of grifters who want Biden to win because they have positioned themselves to feed directly from the rotting carcass of Biden’s administration, but it is only family members and close conspirators who need it to be Biden and not some other Democrat leader.

I personally prefer the idea of Biden surviving to the extent that the Dem’s feel they can’t replace him. I want the Democrat leader to go to the election with all that baggage – all the personal, moral, administrative, and constitutional failings of which Biden is the very quintessence. The sight of that mumbling, shambling, crumbling husk is enough to infuriate any goodly burgher.

Bringing in a cleanskin who makes new ‘promises’ and says they will now clean up problems Joe has obstinately allowed to fester might actually appeal to some people who are voting Trump because he is not Biden.

I hope BobTheBuilder is right and that Trump makes a point of focussing on Biden’s prickliness – when Biden is hopped up on his meds he gets very nasty. He was never a clever man, but his dotage has taken away any check on his temper. He repeats the old discredited lies like saying dead servicemen and women are ‘suckers and losers’ with abrupt flashes of anger (and also overlooking the truth of how he has treated troops). He finishes off such claims with a squinty-eyed “How dare he? How dare he?” Or the lie about Charlottesville, now recognised as a lie even by woefully partisan Snopes.

Perhaps even mention how his own criminality is now known to the public thanks to his ratfink drug-forked son.

While Biden supporters will claim that Biden is merely shaking with righteous anger at the outrages levelled at him, Trump supporters will enjoy watching Orange Hitler playing with the mean creep like a cat toying with a mouse.

Maybe I should post this (edited) reply to Vicki in the main section:

I don’t think Assange is a hero and I don’t “celebrate” his return. However, I believe he has “served his time” and that’s the end of the matter.

There is a place for breaking the law for the sake of conscience and the greater good, provided one accepts there will be a penalty. To the extent that Assange seemed to believe he was exempt from penalty, he was either naive or narcissistic – or both, some will aver.

Moens & Zimmerman make excellent points about free speech. I suspect most Australians don’t realise how severely curtailed free speech is in this country. That’s the context for their above piece.

Don’t know if it has been noted before, but there is a mock ad for a sleeping medication called Bidenica.

It is being attributed to the Trump campaign but I think it was actually produced by a person called Jimmy Fallia, who is a radio host. There is no reference at the end to it being a part of the Trump campaign, at least.

The Don just getz better .. Bidenica .. sleep aid .. LOL!

https://twitter.com/i/status/1806319900190974411

House That! Ben Wyatt moving on from Nedlands mansion only a couple of years after buying it for $3.69m
Kim MacdonaldThe West Australian
Fri, 28 June 2024

Former State treasurer Ben Wyatt must have got used to a week being a long time back when he was in politics, considering he is selling his Nedlands home only two years after buying it.
The first two years at a new home feels like the honeymoon stage for most buyers, but Wyatt is already set to move on, seeking offers on the four-bedroom home he bought for $3.69 million home in May 2022.
It is a surprising move given it took him a year to find the home after an exhaustive search across Perth.
House That! does not know if he, wife Vivianne and their children are preparing to move on to bigger and better things, or seeking to downsize from the four-bedroom property.

Today’s Labor Party – living in mansions for the good of the working class – it’s a long way from Ben Chifely’s Bathurst cottage..

Darebin City Council taking considerable leave of their senses. Going vegan apparently. Good Lord

Is it possible the bloke in the UK said “forkin Paki”?