Open Thread – Mon 2 Sept 2024


On the road. Retreat and escape …, Vasily Vereshchagin, 1887-1895

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caveman
caveman
September 2, 2024 12:11 am

There’s no occasion, I just stumbled into first spot

caveman
caveman
September 2, 2024 12:21 am

This will be known as the secret cultural thread.

caveman
caveman
September 2, 2024 12:25 am

Plus it will be known as the greed thread…I just take all three spots.

John H.
John H.
September 2, 2024 12:42 am
JC
JC
September 2, 2024 1:28 am

dover0beach

September 1, 2024 11:29 pm

If you had no right to life, and thus were denied the protection of the law from physical attack, the least of your worries is whether you enjoyed the right of free expression. Let’s say your protesting the absence of the former by exercising the latter, what stops the government or your neighbor from legally killing you? Nothing at all. Sure you had a right of free expression, but since nothing stops them from legally killing you you can hardly say its foundational.

Your argument essentially suggests an absurd scenario, similar to the situation of a Jew in Nazi Germany, where legal protections for life are nonexistent or meaningless. In such a scenario, you’re right that free expression might seem irrelevant because the state or your neighbor could kill you with no sanction. However, let’s go along with this.

Even in extreme situations, history shows us that the right to free expression—whether formally recognized or not—has been the only thing available to challenge such extremes. How about resistance movements, underground groups and defiant acts that are seen in totalitarian regimes? What are these other than expressions of dissent even in the face of death?

The very fact these expressions were so risky shows just how important free expression is. In totalitarian societies risking one’s life underlines the importance of the right to dissent. This shows they know that without the ability to communicate or resist there is no hope to elevate any other rights including the absurdity of no right to life you came up with.

Lastly, your argument overlooks the most important factor of all. The right to free expression holds up other rights especially the right to hold onto you life. It creates the safeguards to protect life, liberty and security.

But then, as you say, you’re not a fan of rights – even positive rights.

John H.
John H.
September 2, 2024 1:41 am
Steve trickler
Steve trickler
September 2, 2024 3:16 am

David’s wife is spot on. Ezra Levant is a great boss. He backs his staff 100%.

Would like to see them visit Oz for a holiday. No doubt Avi would invite them to stay at his home.

—–

Rebel News HQ:

Deja vu as prosecutor throws out Toronto police charges (again!) against David Menzies

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IT0TvecHsZY

Top Ender
Top Ender
September 2, 2024 3:32 am

Postcard from Portugal

River cruisers are not allowed to move at night on Portugal’s Douro River, due to its being narrow, the many locks and the low height of many bridges.  The Douro is a winding narrow river which meanders through terraced wine country. 

Our ship is brand-new and we are the guinea-pigs (arrived the day before we sailed).  Some things forgotten, funnily enough no rubbish bins in the cabins, and some problems with the plumbing.  But everything wonderfully new, comfortable and lovely furniture.  Like the fact that there is no bottled water available – we are drinking the local water from the river. Includes a tiny swimming pool.  150 clients on board, so we are more intimate with fellow shipmates and the staff. Mostly Australians, few Brits and one or two Americans/Canadians.  Run by Travelmarvel which is owned by APT. Everything included – drinks with meals, excursions, tips etc.

Yesterday we went through the river’s biggest lock: a 37m rise in 20 minutes once we were inside. Nice engineering, although the image of being at the bottom of it with the lock gate in front of us holding back 37m of water was unnerving in its potential horror. 

The sunset cruise around Porto was also memorable: five bridges, some inspired by engineers from the Victorian era. One designed by Eiffel.  Lovely illuminated forts, cathedrals on hill-tops etc.  Lisbon was nice enough in its central tourist areas: wide streets with trees in the centre, historic buildings and lots of statues and fountains. Portuguese are very proud of their country and don’t like to be considered Spanish.

Yesterday’s excursion was to the town of Lamego, about 30,000 people. The bus landed us at the top of the nearby small mountain at the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Assumption, built in 1129. The church and view were terrific.  We walked the 780 steps down to the town where they were gearing up for the annual festival in her name. Amazed how many were walking up!   In olden times, people apparently climbed on their knees – presumably some sort of penance.

Sadly, just nearby was a firefighting helicopter crash into the river with four killed. The pilot was rescued by a tourist boat. Today is a National Day of Mourning, the president has just said.
 
The river is very windy, some 90-degree bends.  Wine is incredibly cheap here – our guide says cheaper than buying water.  We had dinner out at a local winery last night producing muscatel and port wine – very nice. 
After scenic cruising this morning, we are out this afternoon to see/walk medieval town.  Dinner is a Portuguese bbq on top deck and a local band coming onboard to entertain.

Steve trickler
Steve trickler
September 2, 2024 3:56 am

It’s a repeat.

Jean Michel Jarre – Oxygene Pt. 4 (Moreno J Remix)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9Tg2skbOBJw

Tom
Tom
September 2, 2024 3:59 am
Tom
Tom
September 2, 2024 4:00 am
Tom
Tom
September 2, 2024 4:01 am
Tom
Tom
September 2, 2024 4:01 am
Tom
Tom
September 2, 2024 4:02 am
Tom
Tom
September 2, 2024 4:03 am
Tom
Tom
September 2, 2024 4:04 am
Tom
Tom
September 2, 2024 4:04 am
Tom
Tom
September 2, 2024 4:05 am
Rosie
Rosie
September 2, 2024 4:10 am

Me too.
I’m at the airport.
I did a late check out, probably should have asked for a 4 pm but didn’t want to go overboard.
Flight doesn’t go til ten pm.
I was lucky there was a local bus that stops at the airport so it was just a matter of dragging my bags to the stop at the shopping centre.
There is a big sign at the airport about ending fossil fuels.
Naturally everyone was reading it and cancelling their flights en masse.

I went to mass in Drogheda in the morning.
Started reading the bulletin, today’s gospel got tied in to climate changy so I did thinking instead of reading before mass, sermon went there as well.
I suppose you have to grin and bear it, it is Ireland.
Yesterday I went to Ardgillan castle, the driver promised to stop but forgot, fortunately I realised and wasn’t carried too far away.
You have to walk over a footbridge across the railway line to enter the demense, bridge built for the family that owned the property (and they part owned the railway line Belfast to Dublin which they could flag down at will back in the day) so they could still get to their private beach. It’s not a proper castle but grand enough with a large walled garden and conservatory with beautiful lawns (acres of them) behind and running down towards the Irish sea, it’s a bit out of Balbriggan on the way to Skerries, a blue day so it was quite perfect.
The line between sea and sky was hazy, and the view from the castle I doubt anyone could get sick of.
The original landowner was canny, sold his property in Sussex and, cashed up, bought up 21,000 acres from Cromwellian soldiers who’d had grants after that particular land grab.
Lived very well off rents until right to buy whittled away their holdings and they sold their property to the Irish government in 1982.
The house has a series of tunnels below, like Johnstown in Wexford servants were not to be seen unless strictly necessary.
Waiting for the bus to get there was sufficient time to hear the entire life story of a local lady.

Steve trickler
Steve trickler
September 2, 2024 4:43 am

The editing is brilliant!

Hold on tight.

Moreno J Mix Vol 02 – Moreno J Remixes (The Re-edited)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqBB4xntYlk

Peter Greagg
Peter Greagg
September 2, 2024 5:26 am

From the Oz
?Baseless claims of racism and virtue signalling won’t help Indigenous cause

Victorian barrister Lana Collaris was recently branded a racist because she chose not to do a welcome to country at a meeting of the Victorian Bar Council. Instead Collaris acknowledged all Australians.
Overuse of the welcome to country practice is a problem and deserves discussion. For those who disagree with Collaris, they are entitled to challenge her and state their case why they believe it is an appropriate ritual. But to call her racist for declining to do one is unfounded and absurd.
The kind of criticism Collaris has experienced is neither new nor rare. For as long as I can remember, too many people have been far too quick to scream racism against Aboriginal Australians where there is none. Many of this newspaper’s readers will recall the unprecedented backlash the late, great Bill Leak received for drawing a cartoon that drew attention to the neglect too many Aboriginal children face.

For as long as I can remember, people have been routinely claiming Aboriginal Australians are the victims of endless racism. This has resulted in branding Australia as a racist nation against Aboriginal Australians.

Claims of Australia being racist towards Indigenous Australians peaked during and after the voice referendum. Consider the words of ABC Indigenous affairs reporter Bridget Brennan, as recently quoted in The Australian: “When there is so much racism embedded in this country … (during the voice) it was really horrible as an Aboriginal person … We know what exists in Australian society, we see it every day.”
I challenge the claim that we are a racist country against Indigenous people, mostly on the basis that any evidence provided to support the claim is weak or absent. Claims by themselves, however frequent, are simply assertions, not evidence. If Brennan wants to describe exactly what it is she sees each day, I’m perfectly willing to listen. So why are so many Australians so keen to claim we are a racist nation against Indigenous Australians?
I propose a couple of reasons. First, as I wrote in this paper recently when addressing Laura Tingle’s claim that we are racist country, if we hear a message often enough, we start to believe it. Psychologists have a term for this – illusory truth. For as long as I can remember, the media, leaders, academics and lay people have proudly shouted the message that Indigenous Australians are endlessly victims of racism.

Once the belief that we are a racist country is planted in the minds of ordinary people, confirmation bias takes over and they will interpret events and claims in ways that affirm their existing beliefs. A classic illustration is the number of Australians who saw the failure of the voice referendum as proof positive Australia is racist towards Indigenous Australians.

However, 60 per cent of voting Australians did not say no to Indigenous Australians; they said no to a significant proposal that lacked clarity in how it would help Indigenous Australians.
Certainly, there are a small minority of Australians who are racist against Indigenous Australians, but their prevalence is not sufficient to condemn Australia as a racist country.
Using an analogy to elaborate on this, consider that there are many Indigenous Australians who are financially comfortable. It would be foolish to conclude on this basis that Indigenous Australians are financially well off – a few are, but far too many are not.
A second and often overlooked reason claims of racism against Indigenous Australians prevail is that it provides some certainty, when trying to understand the complex reasons for why Indigenous Australians disproportionately suffer poorer health and wellbeing. Rather than addressing factors such as education, employment and remoteness, stating “systemic racism is the problem” provides a sense of certainty and is the quick and easy solution.
This has obvious appeal. Schools can teach their students to apologise for colonisation, the corporates can roll out their cultural awareness programs, and governments can continue with their anti-racism campaigns. Such “well-intentioned” gestures are virtue-signalling at best. In the end, they harm race relations and impact most adversely on Indigenous Australians.

The aforementioned virtue-signallers represent a minority of Australians. Most Australians know that we as a nation are hardworking allies with much good will towards our Indigenous brothers and sisters. However, the constant claims that Indigenous Australians are the victims of a racist country must test the patience and good will of the average Aussie.
But I do not see the torrent of claims of racism against Indigenous Australians abating anytime soon, particularly given the renewed focus on a Makarrata commission that will oversee “truth-telling”. I’m happy to be proven wrong, but I strongly suspect this truth-telling will conclude that racism is the big culprit holding Indigenous Australians back. Let’s start with this truth: racism is not the big culprit holding Indigenous people back today.
We all agree that when racism against Indigenous Australians rears its head, we all have a responsibility to stamp it. But we should be just as diligent in stamping out false claims of racism, otherwise we all suffer.

Anthony Dillon is an Indigenous commentator, and an honorary fellow at the Institute for Positive Psychology and Education at the Australian Catholic University in Sydney.
More Coverage

Gabor
Gabor
September 2, 2024 5:45 am

Looks like a change in the wind.
AfD is winning the election In two states? in Germany, baby steps but they are coming.

Gabor
Gabor
September 2, 2024 5:47 am

Regards to the picture on the new OF, there is a saying, it’s easy to invade Russia, getting out is the hard part.

Tintarella di Luna
Tintarella di Luna
September 2, 2024 5:53 am

Thank you Peter Gregg for posting the article by Anthony Dillon. Anthony is such a gentle beautiful person and his interview with John Anderson is testament to his commitment to making better the lives of Aboriginal Australian by involving ALL Australians to help in doing so, NOT dividing us but UNITING us in the effort.

Steve trickler
Steve trickler
September 2, 2024 5:54 am

Steve trickler
 September 2, 2024 4:43 am

The editing is brilliant!
Hold on tight.
Moreno J Mix Vol 02 – Moreno J Remixes (The Re-edited)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqBB4xntYlk

—–

I’ll post this agian on the next OT.

Steve trickler
Steve trickler
September 2, 2024 5:55 am

Again…

LB2
LB2
September 2, 2024 6:12 am

There was a young man from Japan
Who wrote poems that would not scan
When asked why this was
He said “It’s because
I always try to make the last line as long as I possibly can.”

Gabor
Gabor
September 2, 2024 7:04 am

I am not particularly sentimental but listening to Ode to joy is moving even if it’s by the flashmob.
Actually specially so, while it’s all a set up the audience is mostly unaware.

Alle Menschen werden Brüder
Wo dein sanfter Flügel weilt.

If only.

Couple of links if I may
link2

Cassie of Sydney
September 2, 2024 7:14 am

I would love to go see, hear and have a yarn with Anthony Dillon.

Over the years, at many CPAC, IPA and CIS functions, I’ve had the great privilege of meeting and talking with Anthony Dillon. He is a delightful and thoughtful man.

Anthony was a great friend to the late Bill Leak and is close to Bill’s son, the genius Johannes. Anthony is the son of Queensland’s first indigenous police officer. Do you remember the cartoon Bill did in 2016 about feral indigenous boys running amok? Do you remember the subsequent fall out from that cartoon, when Bill was lynched at the hands of oh so tolerant left it’s media stormtroopers, and scum such as as Fatso Soupman and Gillian Triggs called for Leak to be silenced?

The morning that cartoon was published in 2016, both Anthony and his father rang Bill to tell him how fantastic the cartoon was, how in one cartoon Bill had nailed the issues around male indigenous dysfunction. But the howls of the left and its stormtroopers, the howls for Bill to be silenced and cancelled all had a detrimental effect on Bill’s health and by March the following year…Bill was dead.

Peter Greagg
Peter Greagg
September 2, 2024 7:20 am

From the Oz.
According to Charlmers, the RBA is killing the economy.

Reserve Bank ‘smashing the economy’ via rate hikes, Jim Chalmers declaresJack Quail
 and 
Joe Kelly

Jim Chalmers has declared the ­Reserve Bank is “smashing the economy” with its aggressive run of rate hikes in comments that shift blame on to the central bank governor, Michele Bullock, ahead of data expected to show growth slowing to a crawl.

With increased government spending holding up an economy saddled with anaemic household consumption, faltering business investment and a decline in home building, GDP figures to be ­released on Wednesday are expected to show the Australian economy expanded by a meagre 0.2 per cent in the June quarter.

This would slash annual economic growth from 1.1 per cent in March to just 0.9 per cent for the last financial year – the weakest annual GDP result since the end of the early 1990s recession outside of the coronavirus pandemic.
GDP per capita is also tipped to slump, marking the sixth consecutive quarter where an increase in the population has outstripped economic growth.
“With all this global uncertainty on top of the impact of rate rises, which are smashing the economy, it would be no surprise at all if the national accounts on Wednesday show growth is soft and subdued,” the Treasurer said. “We anticipated a soft economy at budget time and that’s what most economists now expect to see in these new numbers for the June quarter.”

Dr Chalmers said the government strategy was to strike a balance between taming inflation and providing cost-of-living relief “in an economy already being hammered by higher interest rates and global volatility.”

Since May 2022, the RBA has embarked on its most aggressive tightening cycle since the 1980s, increasing the cash rate 13 times from a record low of 0.1 per cent to its current level of 4.35 per cent as it works to reduce inflation – currently at 3.5 per cent – back to its 2 to 3 per cent target band.
NAB chief economist Alan Oster told The Australian that there was “a serious chance that [GDP growth] could be negative”. Pencilling in an increase of just 0.1 per cent, he said there was “no momentum in the economy and it’s not getting any better”.

With the RBA’s own staff forecasts also tipping a GDP reading in line with consensus forecasts, analysts anticipate Wednesday’s figures are unlikely to spur the RBA to push ahead with rate cuts before the end of the year.
KPMG chief economist Brendan Rynne said he didn’t think there would be “anything in this data that’s going to cause a shock to the Reserve Bank”. “We’ve still got inflation that’s too high and when you look at our real interest rate, it is still relatively more ­accommodative than what you’re seeing in other jurisdictions, like the United States,” he said.
Investors are betting that the US Federal Reserve will lower its key policy rate in just over two weeks and join central banks in Britain, Canada, New Zealand, Switzerland and the eurozone. However, the RBA is expected to lag its global peers in pushing ahead with rate reductions, with most economists not expecting cuts until 2025.
Opposition Treasury spokesman Angus Taylor said Labor’s “economic mismanagement had left Australia at the back of the pack”. “We are the only G10 ­nation where core inflation is the same as it was in January,” he said.

Speaking on Friday, RBA deputy governor Andrew Hauser dismissed any chance that the central bank – whose board next meets on September 23-24 – would follow the lead of Fed chair Jerome Powell and cut the cash rate this year. “We’re not yet as confident, as Jay is in the US, that inflation in Australia is back on a sustainable path, back to target. And therefore we have to hold rates where they are for the time being,” Mr Hauser told a podcast hosted by The Conversation.

Across the quarter, household spending is tipped to rise only slightly, with the bulk of the increase attributed to essential purchases. Even as shoppers enjoyed hefty discounts during sales in May and June, retail trade volumes slumped by 0.3 per cent last quarter, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said on Thursday.

Westpac senior economist Pat Bustamante said consumer spending had “broadly flatlined since the December quarter 2022 due to the squeeze on household budgets from bracket creep, higher interest rates and elevated, ­albeit moderating, inflation.”
Residential construction work completed fell across the quarter as the sector faces sustained pressures from elevated interest rates, alongside ongoing labour and material shortages, with the decline expected to weigh on the June quarter GDP figures.
Also set to drag on the GDP result is a reduction in investment in machinery and equipment by businesses, which slipped 0.5 per cent over the quarter, the ABS reported. Oxford Economics’ Sean Langcake said the “relatively weak” figures indicated that the economy may have contracted in the three months to June.
“Coupled with weakness in retail spending … there is a material chance GDP growth was negative in the quarter,” he said.
Economists will fine tune their forecasts ahead of the national accounts figures on Wednesday with separate ABS data released earlier in the week covering business’ profits and inventories, government expenditure, and Australia’s trade account.

As activity in the private sector remains weak, public spending is expected to play a significant role in driving overall economic growth. After a string of big spending state and federal budgets prompted concerns among economists, Ms Bullock has asserted that public demand is “not the main game” in the central bank’s fight against inflation, a claim that Dr Chalmers has repeated on multiple occasions.

In further evidence of the challenging conditions facing segments of the private sector, the Australian Small Business and Family Enterprise Ombudsman, Bruce Billson, will on Monday reveal a 50 per cent rise in help requests from businesses worried about meeting their financial commitments or dealing with insolvent debtors.
Mr Billson said that payment disputes were the greatest area of concern for small businesses and accounted for 42 per cent of total assistance cases in 2023-24 – up from 36 per cent in the year before.
“The construction industry had the highest number of payment disputes,” he said after the sector was rocked by more than 3800 insolvency appointments last financial year.
Releasing the annual summary of assistance provided to small businesses by the Ombudsman, Mr Billson said there were a total of 6254 requests for assistance in 2023-24, a ten per cent increase on the previous year.
The number of requests for help with insolvency had increased by 50 per cent. “Over the past year, small and family business owners have become increasingly worried about being paid as they face challenging business conditions,” he said. “Many small businesses are drawing on their cash buffers to keep their business afloat. Recent surveys have found nearly one-in-four have no cash reserves while 18 per cent have less than a month’s cash at hand to fulfil their obligations.”
Mr Billson said new figures from the ATO showed that 46 per cent of small businesses did not make a profit in the most recent year of available accounts and three quarters of self-employed business owners were earning less than the average weekly wage.

calli
calli
September 2, 2024 7:23 am

This was Leak’s cartoon following the fallout. I’ve kept both as a reminder.

bill-leak-cartoons-Google-Search
calli
calli
September 2, 2024 7:31 am

Trouble was they thought Bill was one of “them”. Until he wasn’t. Reminds me of a certain US Senator.

And hell hath no fury like a Lefty scorned.

Many such cases.

shatterzzz
September 2, 2024 7:38 am

I luvs my life .. LOL! .. Op anti-constipation meds kicked in … middle of the night .. LOL!

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
September 2, 2024 7:39 am

Good morning from Tartaria.

The humidity has started kicking in, about three weeks early. The Build-Up prior to the Wet this year will be absolutely putrid.

Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 7:47 am

@austerrewyatt1

Four people give a restaurant a bad review and you look for a different place to eat.

2,602,082 reports of people who say the vaccine injured them, and you take your child to go get more.

Wally Dalí
Wally Dalí
September 2, 2024 7:51 am

There once was a lawyer named Rex
with miniscule organs of sex.
Arraigned for exposure,
he plead, with composure
“de minimis non curat lex”.

Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 7:56 am
Eyrie
Eyrie
September 2, 2024 8:00 am

From Robert Zimmerman at http://www.behindtheblack.com
A lesson in how government can screw up everything.
Another crime to lay at the feet of JFK, his brothers and the Democrats.

I have written about the negative effects of the 1962 satellite act elsewhere. Prior to its passage, ATT had already privately financed the building of several Telstar satellites and paid for their launch, in order to demonstrate its plans to build a constellation of satellites (in the mid-1960s!) linked to ground stations that would replace the undersea communications cables that were very expensive, difficult to maintain, and very limited in capability. Ma Bell figured it could quickly and for much less money replace those cables with these satellites, and proved it with the first two Telstar launches.
Congress and Kennedy then stepped in and took control, blocking ATT’s effort. The new law mandated that all communications satellites had to built and launched by the quasi-private company Comsat, which was partly run by the feds. Had these government control freaks not interfered, ATT would have been using private money to launch a large satellite constellation in the early 1960s, thus providing lots of business for the rocket companies that were building rockets for NASA.
The law also blocked U.S. television and cable companies from launching their own satellites, which is why the first direct broadcast satellites were launched by Japan, for Japanese customers. It wasn’t until Nixon in the early 1970s that the law was changed, allowing American companies to finally launch their own satellites. However by that time the shuttle was about to go into operation, and NASA and the feds then mandated that all commercial launches had to be launched on it, thus destroying the already weakened American rocket industry of that time.
Had the government left people free to follow their own dreams, we would have seen today’s renaissance in American rocketry happen in the 1960s.

Here’s one of his commenters with further to say:

One of the notable points of the 1962 restriction on private comsats is that France was having real problems with the idea of not controlling what their population heard on TV. They were already screwing around over NATO, and this was yet another irritant. Fortunately, for the the dirigisme State, they had contacts with the WH, through the Bouvier family (Jacqueline Bouvier Kennedy) that made their objections to non-State broadcasting from orbit known.
Meanwhile, the GEO comsat problem with lack of power could be solved by using vastly larger ground antennas, that the French State could license, or pull the license for, at their pleasure. Thus was INTELSAT substituted for the Telstar series and its successors. The Kennedy mafia could thus get around constitutional objections by portraying this as a purely foreign affairs matter, while ignoring those money-grubbing businessmen at AT&T.
It was a successful end-run around the US Constitution, that placed well-connected members of the Demcratic Party’s coalition in charge of foreign news flows, and made sure the industry knew just who was in charge, if they wanted to make money.

Roger
Roger
September 2, 2024 8:04 am

Anthony [Dillon] is the son of Queensland’s first indigenous police officer.

His father Col’s story is remarkable in itself.

He was a 20 year veteran of QLD police whose evidence was crucial to the success of the Fitzgerald Inquiry.

He’s written a memoir called Code of Silence.

Interviewed here in 2016.

Beertruk
September 2, 2024 8:04 am

Cassie of Sydney
 September 2, 2024 7:14 am

calli
September 2, 2024 7:31 am

Trouble was they thought Bill was one of “them”. Until he wasn’t.

I went to Johannes Leak and Fred Pawle’s turnout at Tattersall’s in Brisbane a couple of months ago.
Having a yarn with Johannes the subject of the uproar about his Dad’s cartoon came up. His Dad was a bit of a lefty early on.
‘Mum doesn’t always see eye to eye with my cartoons either, but we still talk and get on with life.’
And Johannes talked about a leftard uproar over a cartoon he did a few years ago about Biden picking Harris as the Vice President.
He said he didn’t notice anything until about two to three days after his cartoon was published. He didn’t apologise, stuck to his guns and a few days after that, the leftard basement dwellers lost interest and moved on the something else.

Ps: I have Bill’s Gaystapo cartoon saved.
Somewhere.

calli
calli
September 2, 2024 8:05 am

It looks like they murdered these poor souls just as their rescuers were coming for them.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/autopsy-finds-6-hostages-shot-multiple-times-at-close-range-in-last-48-72-hours/

I just don’t know what to say, except that I rely on justice being meted out to the foul killers.

How we can be importing unvetted “tourists” from this despicable place is beyond me.

Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 8:11 am
Roger
Roger
September 2, 2024 8:11 am

Only 24% of voters can name a single thing the Albanese government has done that has made their lives better.

Patricia Karvelas thinks the problem is that Elbo & Dim can’t get clear air.

ABC News

Some would say that’s a self-inflicted problem.

Last edited 2 months ago by Roger
Eyrie
Eyrie
September 2, 2024 8:17 am
Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 8:29 am
Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
September 2, 2024 8:36 am

Lying lefty lies lyingly.

Plibersek’s Blayney ruling exposes hypocrisy of our business leaders (Paywallian)
by Lyndon Schneiders

The faux outrage in response to the minister’s goldmine tailings dam decision reeks of bad faith and demonstrates a lack of leadership.

It’s real outrage son. So I looked him up, as you do. He’s a boss of The Wilderness Society. I think we can all guess who is really behind the Blayney gold mine fiasco: not the indigenous lobby.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
September 2, 2024 8:44 am

Blockbuster defamation feud between Brittany Higgins, Senator Linda Reynolds draws to close in WA Supreme Court

Comment awaiting approval.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
September 2, 2024 8:48 am

Newspoll is out.

Anthony Albanese’s approval rating plunges by five percentage points to level him with Peter Dutton in latest Newspoll (Sky News, 2 Sep)

Satisfaction with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s has plunged with his approval rating slumping to its equal lowest since winning the election in 2022 as the major parties remain split at 50-50 on a two-party-preferred basis.

The Prime Minister’s slump in The Australian’s Newspoll survey has brought his standing on par with Opposition Leader Peter Dutton at a net satisfaction rating of minus 13. …

Asked which party they would vote for, the Coalition remained the favourite amongst voters, however they suffered a one per cent drop to 38 per cent while Labor’s standing remained unchanged at 32 per cent.

Support for One Nation rose a point to 7 per cent while the Greens and other minor and independent parties sat unchanged at 12 and 11 per cent respectively.

Based on the poll’s results, Australia is looking at a hung parliament at the next election.

“Meh”, said the voters.

alwaysright
alwaysright
September 2, 2024 8:58 am

Australia is looking at a hung parliament at the next election.

I was hoping for HOP but we take what we can.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
September 2, 2024 9:04 am

Fascist Victoria gets even more fascist.

Parks officials use spy cameras to track climbers, walkers (Paywallian)

Spy cameras hidden in trees and the bush are being used by Parks Victoria to try to prosecute off-grid rock climbers and walkers under its sweeping cultural heritage ­access bans.

If you walk the trails make sure you wear your Guy Fawkes mask. I wonder what the Rainbow Serpent and Bula think of having white people’s cameras watching them 24/7?

Rabz
September 2, 2024 9:05 am

Only 24% of voters can name a single thing the Albansleazy government has done that has made their lives better

I can’t think of any, but I could quickly rustle up a long list of “things” these imbeciles have inflicted on us that have made our lives infinitely worse.

Which of course, the gliberals will do absolutely nothing about rectifying, should they be fortunate enough to blunder back into government next feral erection.

Frank
Frank
September 2, 2024 9:09 am

I think we can all guess who is really behind the Blayney gold mine fiasco: not the indigenous lobby.

I’m still waiting for the ultimate four way identity politics cage match to manifest itself. Muslim, tranny, aborigine and environmentalist go in, only one can come out. That sort of thing.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
September 2, 2024 9:18 am

LOL!

‘Stench worse than a dingo’s arse’: Albo’s absurd gold mine stance (Tele, paywalled)

The more we learn about why the Albanese government put a stop to the Orange gold mine, the worse the stench gets, Warren Mundine writes.

The ALP has moved on from a drover’s dog to a dingo’s arse.

Winston Smith
Winston Smith
September 2, 2024 9:27 am

It’s the Boeing disease – they’ve sacked the engineers and replaced them with accountants.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pBcKSjXzOig
It’s the move that’s destroying the reputation and therefore the sales volumes of US industry. Wait until Toyota and Kubota start making agricultural machinery en masse. They’ll set up shop in the US and wipe John Deere from the board.

Roger
Roger
September 2, 2024 9:33 am

I argued specifically that protection of life (and property) come before free expression because they are foundational.

There’s likely a more fundamental disagreement here, without the resolution of which the question of the ordering of rights won’t be resolved, which is why I saw no value in pursuing the discussion last night.

Not to mention that I’ve long since ceased being a night owl.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
September 2, 2024 9:42 am

This is Australia in the twenty first century – up there with the “Rainbow Serpent”

The application was made on behalf of the corporation by one of its directors, Nyree Reynolds. At some point in Reynolds’ life her family identified an ancestor born two centuries ago they believed to be Wiradjuri. How they came to this belief isn’t clear and the ancestor isn’t identified in reported interviews. Perhaps the ancestor told Reynolds directly. In a video published on Plibersek’s Instagram page, Reynolds said she was asked to apply for the heritage order and agreed because she felt the ancestors calling “help us” every time she drove past the site. Are ministerial decisions in modern Australia now based on claimed messages from deceased people?

In any event, Ah-See, who last week spoke at The Daily Telegraph’s Bush Summit, has said: “We have spoken to the elder who holds the story and he says that area is not sacred … We have done a cultural audit and there were never song lines, it was never an initiation site. This has put Aboriginal culture back 50 years.”

bons
bons
September 2, 2024 10:02 am

My Sunday night call with my UK based daughter was disappointing once again.

My wheedling at her to sell-up and return to Oz achieves nothing.

She is clear sighted about what is happening, but claims that the ‘English’ will win out. Distressing. She is very much under the influence of her ‘Mrs Miniver’ caricature middle class in-laws.

I am unforgivably undermining her by working on her young son. He is a surfing fanatic so I swamp him with lies about Oz surfing.

Bourne1879
Bourne1879
September 2, 2024 10:05 am

The death of the 6 Israeli hostages is tragic to say the least.
I heard on the radio that 800,000 workers will today protest against Netanyahu and Government over not doing more to secure the release of remaining hostages. Plus the relatives adding to the pressure.
I don’t follow Israeli politics too closely but am aware many Israelis and overseas Jews are not great Netanyahu fans.
However if you were going to unfortunately be taken hostage by terrorists I would want it to be the IDF looking for and doing the rescuing.
As for Netanyahu my only conclusion is that he is in one of the most difficult positions a national leader could be. He has to balance the lives of the hostages against the greater national interest of ending Hamas.
By having such large protests aren’t the protests signalling to Hamas that killing some more might help their cause even more ?
Either way i hope Israel secures the release of more hostages whilst continuing to hunt down, for decades if necessary, those responsible.

bons
bons
September 2, 2024 10:19 am

Winston, the corporates are actually well behind the Administrative State in removing experts and replacing them with ‘generalists’.

You may recall how during the 80’s specialist professionals and centers of knowledge were replaced by University of Canberra arts and economics ‘graduates’.

They crowed endlessly about this brilliant reform. The introduction of flexible thinking into the hidebound realm of technical departments and organisations. NBN was an inevitable outcome.

The first thing that they did was to introduce flexitime.

I recall speaking to a lifelong chalkie who was glancingly involved in the Commonwealth takeover of education. “Experienced educators need not apply”!

Miltonf
Miltonf
September 2, 2024 10:21 am

The Blaney sabotage is getting even more ridiculous. Claimed messages from deceased persons? Sounds like schitzophrenia.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
September 2, 2024 10:21 am

Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble.

A street performer blew bubbles in a park. Officials cited him for littering. (31 Aug)

Blowing bubbles is illegal in San Diego — or at least it was early Saturday evening at a public park in one of the city’s wealthiest neighborhoods.

Sandy Snakenberg who’s been performing as “the Bubble Pirate” for about a decade, was making desk-sized bubbles for children at 5:15 p.m. when two San Diego Parks and Recreation rangers approached and threatened to write him a citation for littering if he didn’t stop.

Snakenberg protested, saying that most of his bubbles evaporated when they popped, and the droplets that fell to the ground were harmless. One of the rangers, Roberto Bejar, disagreed.

“It’s littering in bubble form,” Bejar said, according to a video Snakenberg took of the encounter and shared with The Washington Post.

Littering in bubble form? I’m going to have to listen to Arlo Guthrie’s Alice’s Restaurant again. Oh, and an apology to Mr Shakespeare.

Arky
September 2, 2024 10:27 am

Thanks to DB on the last thread for actually giving some pushback on my “rights” contention.
Dover, last night:

I’m not a fan of rights talk but I don’t think anyone that seriously uses that term thinks that the enjoyment of a right means you cannot be deliberately or accidentally killed, or that either renders the notion meaningless. Rights talk is in many ways a short hand of speaking about what is good for human beings. If you are going to drop it you are going to have to have something that replaces it, and one way is to talk about goods. Preserving life rather than the right to life. Shuning ignorance rather than right to an education. These goods are related hierarchically, so the higher ones presuppose the lower ones but the lower ones are for the higher ones.

I think your first instinct to shun rights talk is the correct one, but you have made the case for rights, which no one else has bothered to do, (while just taking for granted like most that rights are a good) so I’ll tackle that.
Let’s take a specific right, the ”right to free speech”.
A libertarian will hear that right spoken of and conclude that it means no government can make laws that impede on a citizens right to free speech. Fair enough, I suppose, maybe.
A leftist will hear of that right, and conclude they have the right to fill every available space, private and public with their inane stupidity and perversions, and that anyone impeding them in doing so should be incarcerated or murdered. In other words, they will weaponise that right to disrupt and confound anyone going about their ordinary business.
A conservative will hear of a “right to free speech” and conclude that it’s purpose is in order for everyone within society to be able to politely and without fear of violence have their say, conduct civil conversations, exchange ideas etc.
A Christian will hear the “right to free speech” and conclude that it is some inherent value within humans given by God that everyone should have the ability to express themselves, as part of the dignity of man.
So we come across problem number one with rights talk. No one agrees precisely what they are, what they are for or upon what they are based or precisely where they reside.
Let’s take the death penalty.
A rights fanatic from the libertarian side might say that you can’t execute a mass murderer, because you don’t want to give the state that power.
Meanwhile a leftist rights fanatic might say that you can’t execute a mass murderer because to do so will take away that persons rights to free speech, a free education, free health care and free accommodation.
A conservative rights fanatic will say you can’t execute a mass murderer because there is a precautionary, conservative principal about the dangers of applying such a final and irreversible penalty to people who may in some cases be innocent.
A Christian rights fanatic will claim that God still loves the criminal and his or her life remains uniquely valuable, and that we have no right to usurp God’s judgement.
Whereas Arky says “F*ck that murderer, you “rights” nuts are as annoying as hell, this monster needs to be dead, and any fool can see that”.
Now libertarians, leftists, conservatives and Christians can’t all be simultaneously wrong about the same thing all at once, unless there is some thing that has waylaid all of them. And in that case we can clearly see that the thing that has put them wrong is the insistence in the existence and importance of rights, against the correct and good exercise of duty, love and justice.

Last edited 2 months ago by Arky
cohenite
September 2, 2024 10:33 am

The ALP has moved on from a drover’s dog to a dingo’s arse.

Really Bruce, this is a family site; language! You don’t see me calling the filth and liars a pack of arseholes.

Bourne1879
Bourne1879
September 2, 2024 10:38 am

Some may recall the Brisbane hot coffee thrown over the baby case from several days ago.

The media have had a pretty good picture of the suspect’s face for days. Definitely not Caucasian or Middle eastern in appearance. Looks Chinese. However not seen any articles that actually say that.

I heard a local from the area on the radio. He did not know him but named three places in the area where thinks seen him.

The radio station was also suggesting State Government announce a reward leading to arrest. I agree even if only say $10,000.

In view of the photo I am finding it hard to understand why not been caught yet.

Eyrie
Eyrie
September 2, 2024 10:47 am

Dutton now needs to hammer cost of living and his proposed solutions.

Build time machine.
Travel back to January 1 2020
Shoot Frydchickenburger

Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 10:47 am
Eyrie
Eyrie
September 2, 2024 10:53 am

We aren’t the only idiots:

https://mishtalk.com/economics/d-c-court-cancels-three-approved-lng-projects-over-environmental-justice/

These projects are in the same region as Starbase and the same suspects are trying to stop that.

Boambee John
Boambee John
September 2, 2024 10:58 am

 “We have spoken to the elder who holds the story and he says that area is not sacred … We have done a cultural audit and there were never song lines, it was never an initiation site. This has put Aboriginal culture back 50 years.”

And until genuine aborigines are willing to take on and repudiate publicly the fakes, this setback will continue.

And if they are not willing to defend their “culture” from frauds, their time in the sun will come to an end.

Last edited 2 months ago by Boambee John
Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 10:58 am

“I have been criminalised by the biggest criminals of all – those who sit in our parliament”.

@CoviLeaks

Whether you’re in the UK or abroad, this message needs to be heard, please share & support.

Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 11:00 am

Indeed.

@robinmonotti

The UK “smoking ban” outdoors has nothing to do with smoking or the NHS. It is a behavioural compliance mass psychology test, just like the useless face masks were during Covid. The behavioural psychologists behind Starmer want to asses what levels of compliance there are in the UK if absurd laws are justified in the name of the “greater good”. It’s a preliminary test to see how far the tyranny can go with the bogus excuse of justifying dictatorship with “public health”. We have seen it all before with Covid under Boris Johnson.

Arky
September 2, 2024 11:05 am

Roger

 September 2, 2024 10:44 am

 Reply to  Arky

 And in that case we can clearly see that the thing that has put them wrong is the insistence in the existence and importance of rights, against the correct and good exercise of duty, love and justice.

No, properly understood and exercised, rights and duties aren’t contradictory.

Let’s imagine you are about to be sent to an island with a group of a dozen others.
You get to choose between two groups.
The first group you interview and the entire discussion is about what everyone’s rights will be during the time on the island. Various members stand up and give long expositions on what they expect their rights to be and how others should conduct themselves towards them.

The other group the entire discussion is about duties. One member after another stands up and asks to be given responsibility for various duties.

Which group do you pick?

Hugh
Hugh
September 2, 2024 11:26 am

Thank you Indolent for the excellent link you posted at 10:58. Highly recommended.

Morsie
Morsie
September 2, 2024 11:28 am

I expect much of the electorate will see attacking the RBA as a positive for Labor on the basis that the RBA is keeping rates high.
Much of the electorate will have no idea of the role of the federal and state governments in in keeping the economy over stimulated.

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 11:46 am

I’m not giving you a scenario at all. I’m illustrating that the right to life is more foundational then free speech.

You’re leading to the scenario I posted.
Life is certainly essential (obviously), but free expression is how rights are articulated and defended as well as preserved. If you cannot express ideas and challenge authority, other rights are easily taken away. It’s free expression that allows people to advocate for the right to life, property, religion, etc.
 

Let’s put life aside in this scenario. could you argue that speech is more important than association? No, what will be far more important for these groups is the ability to organize themselves into groups, firstly, and then secondly, speech.

Free expression, the right of dissent, and freedom of association are all linked, and one could argue they are gifts in one box. Seriously though, how can you have freedom of association in the context we’re discussing (not a young mother’s group) and not have freedom of expression? Freedom of expression is an integral part of freedom of association.
 

Not at all. In a situation in which none of these rights are protected, people will organize to preserve their most basic rights first. They will want their life and property to receive the protection of the law, firstly, because they are the most essential rights, and then move on to the less basic rights like assembly and speech.

Please explain how, if there is a state mobilization against life and property, how would people agitate against the erosion of these rights? Your argument is backward logic. As I mentioned earlier, historically, societies that erode free expression also see the erosion of other rights. And the right to dissent is always the first to go, for good reason.
 

Yes, because rights are for goods, not ends themselves, and that has been lost sight of by an inordinate focus on rights.

 
Positive rights too?

Oh come on
Oh come on
September 2, 2024 11:50 am

Here’s a nice tale of how to keep rich Yank kids grounded:

I thought I was giving my kids the best childhood ever until my 4-year-old asked why we didn’t own a ‘bigger golf cart’

Today, my husband and I live in an affluent area and are lucky enough to have disposable income each month. Our community also has well-maintained parks, pools, and water parks. We even have a golf cart, much to my chagrin.

Humble-brag much?

I thought I was giving my kids the best childhood ever until my 4-year-old asked why we didn’t own a “bigger golf cart.” A few weeks later, he asked me what it meant to be rich. I thought I had time to teach my two young kids about money, but I was wrong.

Oh noes! What to do? Mrs Moneybags has four top ideas and the first made me laugh:

1. I’m limiting gifts

Well that’s not a bad start, but, as always, the Devil’s in the details:

I’ll be the first to admit I love holidays. I’ve always thrown myself headfirst into the decor, themed birthday parties, and, yes, even gifts. But as my kids have gotten older, I’ve realized that I’m not doing them any favors by having a towering stack of gifts on every holiday. 

That’s why my husband and I set a limit for gifts for the two major holidays — five for birthdays and 10 for Christmas. While our gift limits may not work for everyone, it’s what works best for our family. An added bonus? It helps take some of the stress out of the holidays. 

Wtf? How many gifts? Lol oh only ten for Christmas? And only five for a birthday? I mean, imagine it. Happy birthday son, please note your meagre hoard of but five presents: an Xbox, a full drum kit, a surf board, a pony and…your very own golf cart, just like Mom and Dad! Now hopefully you’re starting to realise that you can’t have everything you want, okay?

Just five presents on birthdays and ten at Christmas. That’s borderline child abuse.

We’re not out of touch in thinking that such “limits” might be regarded as miserly by other families. Not at all.

What my kids get is one on their birthdays and two for Christmas – one from their parents and one from Father Christmas (also what I got). I guess we need to be reported to child protection or something.

Last edited 2 months ago by Oh come on
Wally Dali
Wally Dali
September 2, 2024 12:07 pm

Kubota have done their dash re agricultural equipment. Woke is one thing… breakable is another. The M108 is nice enough, but every other tractor is flim flam.

Arky
September 2, 2024 12:23 pm

just drove to training.
The discussion on the radio illustrates my point.
Some bird from tennents association banging on about renters “rights”.
Keep pushing it love, see what their rights are when no one wants
any longer to rent them anything.

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
September 2, 2024 12:28 pm

Further to comments upthread about the lunatic decision by the dealers missus to stop a goldmine because of secret pretend abo business told by a dentally challenged pretend abo called Nyree Reynolds….

Her offsider, probably among the 18 who can’t be named by the Slovenian Hag – because secret abo business (ala Hindmarsh Island) – is Delanie Sky. Sussed out by others also upthread.

Age 46, with a teenage daughter who has a history of self-harming, anorexia and lives with depression and anxiety (no fcuking wonder!).

Delanie Sky is Adjunct Lecturer, School of Information and Communication Studies, Faculty of Arts and Education, Charles Sturt University, Bathurst, NSW, Australia

So, a permanent student who has never had a real job in her life.

These are the people Blabbersack relies on to get advice on stopping billion dollar mining projects.

DrBeauGan
DrBeauGan
September 2, 2024 12:33 pm
Barking Toad
Barking Toad
September 2, 2024 12:35 pm

Tanya Plibersek acquires a new nickname to go with “Dealers Missus”, “Slovenian Hag”, “Blabbersack”.

Dingo’s Arse.

Miltonf
Miltonf
September 2, 2024 12:37 pm

More proof that ‘universities’ have a lot to answer for. Close them down and go back to institutes of technology minus ‘communication’ courses.

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 12:52 pm

In a situation in which none of these rights are protected, people will organize to preserve their most basic rights first. They will want their life and property to receive the protection of the law, firstly, because they are the most essential rights, and then move on to the less basic rights like assembly and speech.

Oh yeah, and they would do this without free expression how?

Also, you are conflating expression with the right of free expression. You’re assuming that “express[ing] ideas and challeng[ing] authority’ is the right of free expression when it isn’t. The latter simply seeks to protect the former.

You appear to now introducing the right to free expression and expression itself as being different. If your argument became any narrower it would be invisible. Unfortunately, trying to distinguish between the legal right to free expression and expression isn’t as clear cut as you want people to believe.

Free expression is foundational by providing safeguards for dissent and to challenge authority. Without this right everything else is severely compromised.

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 1:01 pm

You suggested you’re “not a fan of rights”.

This explains nihilism, or radical nihilism, which disavows, laws, contracts and human interactions at the most basic.

Even in the most totalitarian states such as Russia, China, Iran and NK there is some recognition of rights otherwise there’s no social stability.

Wow, we’ve really moved on from Milne and Oakshott.

Tintarella di Luna
Tintarella di Luna
September 2, 2024 1:01 pm

A situation in which a widowed friend finds herself. She has 3 adult children, one is quite grounded and stable, the other two are sons – one is married with 4 children and a wife who looks for points of argument with her MIL but is a good woman, just a millennial one, the other son finds himself in a desperate bind, was going out with a woman for a matter of months then she became pregnant — he was not looking for a child or a permanent relationship but there you have it. My widowed friend had a friend build a granny flat on her property which is her only asset and the unattached son, partner and little child moved into the granny flat and for 6 months paid no rent.

Now they’re paying rent and my friend asked that they sign a Residential Tenancy agreement simply to establish a landlord/tenant relationship — the son will sign it but the partner won’t. What can my friend do — i know what I would do but she is a loving wonderful person who just wants to help her children.

Any suggestions would be appreciated

Last edited 2 months ago by Tintarella di Luna
Steve trickler
Steve trickler
September 2, 2024 1:37 pm

Always good to have a listen every couple of years. ATC Lady goes into immediate MUM mode. Followed up from the blokes in Father mode.

Maggie freaked out at first but calmed herself down.

17-YEAR-OLD STUDENT PILOT LANDS HER PLANE WITHOUT A WHEEL!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B229-KLudTo

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
September 2, 2024 1:41 pm

From the Hun….

A Dreamworld tiger handler was walking one of the big cats when it attacked her according to authorities.
A 47-year-old woman working at the theme park’s tiger attraction was rushed to hospital on Monday morning after she was mauled by one of the animals.
The handler was working with the tiger about 9am when the attack happened.

Probably forgot to dish out the morning feed.

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 1:45 pm
Bourne1879
Bourne1879
September 2, 2024 1:47 pm

Political correctness gone crazy. Courier Mail just put up article about the coffee baby attack and this is the description:

“The attacker is described as around 30 to 40 years old, of a proportionate build, with tanned skin. He was wearing a black hat, glasses, a shirt and shorts”.

Tanned skin ! Tanned skin could be an Anglo who overdoes it at the beach. The guy is definitely Asian and if I was describing him with a view to trying to get the public’s help I would say Chinese looking.

Seems the police have 29 officers on the hunt. Probably checking tanning salons!

I would have at least 1/3 officers visiting every Chinese food outlet in Chinatown and the Sunnybank area with the photos. Plus the Universities nearby. Somebody must know him.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
September 2, 2024 1:53 pm

Reynolds harassed Higgins with leaks, lawyer argues

Linda Reynolds harassed Brittany Higgins by leaking confidential documents and engaging with the lawyer representing Ms Higgins’ rapist, the former staffer’s lawyer says.
And Senator Reynolds’ submission to the Sofronoff Inquiry demonstrated that the senator “wished to silence sexual assault survivors”, Ms Higgins’ lawyer Rachael Young SC has told the WA Supreme Court.
Continuing her closing submissions, Ms Young said the leaking of confidential and privileged documents to the media, her conduct during Bruce Lehrmann’s rape trial, and her Sofronoff submission all showed that the senator had in fact harassed Ms Higgins.
Ms Young said Ms Higgins’ publications were protected by qualified privilege, and defences of fair comment and honest opinion.

Barking Toad
Barking Toad
September 2, 2024 1:57 pm

From the Oz….

One of Australia’s worst alleged pedophiles has pleaded guilty to all 306 charges of child abuse in Queensland and overseas against dozens of young girls in his care over a 15-year period.
Child care worker Ashley Paul Griffith appeared before Brisbane District Court on Monday as he entered the pleas, more than a year after he was first taken into custody for allegedly abusing 91 young girls over 15 years at childcare centres in Brisbane, Sydney and Italy.
Wearing a striped polo shirt, jeans and red sneakers, Griffith accepted 28 counts of rape against at least 12 different children, 190 counts of unlawfully and indecently dealing with a child, and 67 counts of making child exploitation material.
He also pleaded guilty to 15 counts of maintaining an unlawful sexual relationship with a child as an adult, four counts of producing child abuse material outside of Australia, one count of distributing child abuse material outside of Australia, one count of using a carriage service for child pornography material and one count of possessing child exploitation material.
The Crown prosecutor dropped a further 13 charges at the start of the hearing.

Fcuk I wish we had the death penalty. Although prison justice involving lighter fluid and matches will do.

Lysander
Lysander
September 2, 2024 2:04 pm

A study just released in The Lancet has found that more people die of cold than heat, and global warming is contributing to a reduction in cold-related deaths:

Global, regional, and national burden of mortality associated with non-optimal ambient temperatures from 2000 to 2019: a three-stage modelling study – The Lancet Planetary Health

bons
bons
September 2, 2024 2:05 pm

Great to watch the scandosmug rollmops Abba lose their fight to stop Trump using their bubblegum music.

Yaar Per, eez vaart hafpens venn you sell your rights.

132andBush
132andBush
September 2, 2024 2:15 pm

Winston Smith
September 2, 2024 12:48 pm

Reply to  Winston Smith

i had a bit of a standup argument with the usual commentators here a year or so ago about John Deere and their insistence on being able to do the work on their vehicles and machinery.

What I was trying to get across, despite the continued bullshit and reframing efforts was the software ownership that prevents the owner of the machinery making their own repairs even though it could be done in a day on the farm, instead of JDs workshops 500Km away, next month sometime – if the parts were available.

The link details the farmers frustration at what is really just a money grabbing effort by the JD Corporation.

JD deserve everything the market is going to dump on them.

I am long time owner of JD harvesters (24th season this year) which means, as a contractor, I’ve clocked up at least 12,000 separator hrs in all conditions and nearly all crops.
Add to this my “day job” for a large scale family farming concern who run a large number of JD tractors from 1960’s 4020’s to the modern and very electronic R series.

I will categorically state that I’ve never, nor currently, have any issue from or with John Deere in repairing my own or anyone else’s tractor of harvester. Of course they offer no warranty on workmanship, only on the integrity of parts if they come from them.

WRT the electronics. As with every other manufacturer there is heavy reliance on electric over mechanical/hydraulic systems. ie/ press a button in the cab and it’s connected by the CANBUS wiring system to the actuator that does the mechanical side of things.
Added to this is a huge system of sensors primarily measuring shaft speeds, pressures and temperatures.
On my S680 harvester this entails the linking together of 32 controllers, each with their own settings, some of which can be adjusted, some of which are permanent, as well as their own suit of fault codes.

When (not if) something goes wrong on the electronics or mechanical front a fault code is registered, a list of some are in the operators manual, for others you make a phone call. My dealership runs a dedicated tec support team which costs $500/yr and is money well spent.
You call them up and they can remotely access your machine or you quote fault codes and they walk you through checklists. I have not failed to diagnose a problem and fix it myself using this help. When a controller is out of action it’s usually a case of buying a new one and simply plugging it in, sometimes with a JD mechanic onsite to re boot the whole machine, but this is rare.
Checklists can lead you to a faulty sensor or wiring loom which a half capable person can fix themselves.

Diagnostic software can be purchased from JD and as far as I know you can use it the same as any of their tecs.

This “right to repair” has always baffled me because as far as I can see, if a lot of this stuff fails you can’t repair it anyway!

And as far as I can see the right to diagnose stuff yourself has not been removed.

In my experience the same applies with all other brands.

Farmer Gez
Farmer Gez
September 2, 2024 2:21 pm

Is there any information as to exactly how much electricity each renewable project delivers as compared to blurb?
We’ve tried to get it out of AEMO but it’s all hush hush as to actual performance.

Lysander
Lysander
September 2, 2024 2:51 pm

Charmers has hoodwinked Australians! The Federal Government’s debt interest repayments in 2021/22 was $17.5Bn and is expected to rise, in 2025/26, to $26.3Bn.

That’s just the interest.

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
September 2, 2024 2:52 pm

Many brownie points accumulated by the Cafe head waiter today.

It’s Spring and warm so I recommenced walking at 7:30 am. Half a kilometre down the road and here’s a grey butcherbird waiting. Haven’t seen him for months, but he’d spotted me instantly.

So I crossed the road to say hello to a lady who was cleaning up fallen leaves in her yard, since I know she feeds the magpies and the kookas. I asked do you feed the butcherbirds? Yes, says she, they come down too. I take this cue and wave a piece of mince – sure enough, down comes the butcherbird and lands on the fence between us. I give him the mince. Ooh, that’s cool she says, I can’t do that their beaks are so sharp! Which they are, but I’m a big guy with tough skin, so I can get away with it more than an elderly lady can.

Then since it’s such a nice day I walked down to the shops after lunch. I take food. Just outside front door a rainbow lorikeet lands on my hand, as he often does, so he gets to munch on some bread. Then a test: how far will he stay with me when I walk to the shops? He gets antsier and antsier until finally after about 100 metres he’s had enough.

Another 100m and a peewee is now orbiting my head. I have some mince, so he lands on my hand and takes off with it. He’s an old graduate of the Cafe, but can’t get here because of territorial restrictions. But he spots me instantly when I’m in his territory.

Buy stuff at shops and return. Peewee is waiting again, but he’s warned off by the Southern Magpie pair. They no longer come to the Cafe but if they see me they come over. They get a piece of mince each. Finally I reach home!

All this is very Seinfeldian nothing stuff really, but at the Cafe if I go somewhere it isn’t so much a walk as an expedition.

Wally Dali
Wally Dali
September 2, 2024 2:56 pm

Well if they told you, then you’d have to call in the plate generation figure as disinformation.
Or misinformation.
Or malinformation.
Which is all a bit of a laff, but it’s not like we’re getting our money back, or any of the boondogglers are getting a reposession and reparations bill.

Steve trickler
Steve trickler
September 2, 2024 3:16 pm

bons
September 2, 2024 2:05 pm

Great to watch the scandosmug rollmops Abba lose their fight to stop Trump using their bubblegum music.
Yaar Per, eez vaart hafpens venn you sell your rights.

—–

Good call. Mark Dice made that point the other day. I like some of Abba’s music. They should have kept their mouth shut. As for the Foo Fighters having a winge…garbage music.

Trump needs to go with Classic Philarmonic music.

Arky
September 2, 2024 3:35 pm

Peter Schiff in his latest podcast:
”I remember in the 1980s when the trade deficit was a big number and was one of the reasons we got the 1987 crash”.
”People understood the problems these big trade deficits created”.
”A strong economy doesn’t produce a trade deficit”.
”A strong economy produces a surplus that can be exported”.
”We’re not making the stuff”.
”We don’t have the factories to make the stuff”.
”We don’t have the industrial base”.

Wait long enough, and even the libertarians (the brighter ones at least) start to get it.

Lysander
Lysander
September 2, 2024 3:46 pm
Wally Dali
Wally Dali
September 2, 2024 3:59 pm

Norgwegians eat whale too…
Mmm… whale.

Kneel
Kneel
September 2, 2024 4:03 pm

“Well if they told you, then you’d have to call in the plate generation figure as disinformation.
Or misinformation.
Or malinformation.
Which is all a bit of a laff, but it’s not like we’re getting our money back, or any of the boondogglers are getting a reposession and reparations bill.”

Ha! They don’t even want to pay for decommissioning and land remediation. Of course, if you wanted a nuclear or fossil plant, you’d have to have a plan and cash for that…

In any case, a good guide for “capacity factor” of ruinables is no more than 30% – and that’s if everything is in the goldie-locks zone. No too much, not too little, but juuuuust right.
Of course, no-one will be able to say exactly when you can have it either, you just have to take your chances on that.
Plus you’ll consume 1,000 times the land area to get even that much, and need to build a few thousand km of extra transmission line to carry it.
And if you are lucky, you might get half the life of a fossil or nuclear plant out of it before you need to replace it.
When you do replace it, you’ll be stuck with non-recyclable, non-bio-degradable toxic landfill – noice.

As Kermit says: “It’s not easy being green”.

Lysander
Lysander
September 2, 2024 4:09 pm
PeterM
PeterM
September 2, 2024 4:15 pm

So sick of the gotcha question “Do you accept that Joe Biden won the 2020 election?”. I think the correct answer is that “The election result is disputed”, which is objectively true.

When the stenographer repeats the question “Do YOU accept that Joe Biden won the 2020 election?”, the answer could be;

“Well, it would be nice to be confident that our elections are free and fair but with ongoing problems with electoral rolls integrity, numerous problems with massive numbers of mail-in ballots and unchecked signatures, lack of voter ID requirements as well as many chain-of-custody issues and exclusion of GOP scrutineers at that election in particular, how can anyone be sure? On top of all that, we now know that online media and the MSM were suppressing the Hunter Biden laptop story before the election.

So, I don’t have enough evidence either way”.

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 4:18 pm

As I said earlier, you are counting on something they don’t have at that stage. Again, in a situation in which the protection of the law is uncertain regarding life, property, expression, and the like, you are going to firstly secure life, then property, and so on. This is just obvious.

Interesting, because it’s so obvious? How are you going to secure rights to property, life etc without being able to express or dissent against adverse actions?
 

They are different. You have actual concrete examples of expression (the production of artistic works, books, pamphlets, film, websites, and so on) and you have the protection of these activities in general through law (the right of free expression). Disputes about the exercise of the latter are usually disputes about what falls properly within the former.

I’ve seen freedom of artistic expression in Vietnamese museums – a totalitarian state. That’s not artistic expression; it’s groveling to the ruling regime. You’d rule that as freedom of expression, or not so much?
As I said, free expression isn’t just a legal abstraction—it’s the very medium through which human creativity and societal progress manifest. Limiting this right would stifle the very activities you’re describing.”
 
 

Sorry, but this is just a nonsense interpretation of what I’ve said. How you came to believe its nihilistic to prefer talking about goods rather than rights, or that it disavows law and human interactions remains a mystery. And its ironic that you should mention Oakeshott because he wasn’t a fan of rights talk, and he certainly didn’t think that free expression was the preeminent right. As for Mill, I’ve always been a critic of Mill and utilitarianism has always had an uneasy peace with rights, since its father, Bentham, thought they were ‘nonsense on stilts’.

Rights, particularly the right to free expression, provide a foundation for individuals to advocate for and secure those goods in a way that respects human ideals. Seriously now, are you therefore arguing in the benevolence and the altruism of regimes to know exactly what they should do?
 
I think you misunderstood Oakeshott, or perhaps forgotten. He was critical of rights, etc. if they became ideological rather than practical. Why else would he have discussed issues like how can we live together in a civil association—an association that relies on discourse, debate, and the free exchange of ideas? In other words, he assumed preeminence of the right to free expression. And by the way, I began reading some of his works when you often talked about him at the old blog.
 
You also had me read Mill’s On Liberty years ago. Mill defended open debate as a way to reach the truth and help humans develop. Mill was for debate and discussion to enable a healthy, dynamic society.
 
(Mill, not Milne)
 
 
I’m ending this here because there’s not much more to be said.

Kneel
Kneel
September 2, 2024 4:27 pm

“”We’re not making the stuff”.
”We don’t have the factories to make the stuff”.
”We don’t have the industrial base”.

Largely true, but there are exceptions – like where I work.
We export a container a month just to the USA of fairly low-tech stuff, plus low and high-tech stuff to plenty of other places around the world – Europe, Asia, and the Americas.
This is stuff made here – in Melbourne and Adelaide in fact.
We can do that because we are best in the world at what we do and have preferred supplier status with some very big global names in our industry. Plus we are supplying for big infrastructure programs here in oz like tunnels, airports etc.
We kept growing even during COVID, and it seems not a week goes by I don’t get an email about another new employee.
We could have off-shored all of it and made more money for a few years, but the owners are canny enough to know that keeping things made locally gives much tighter control over quality.

Steve trickler
Steve trickler
September 2, 2024 4:30 pm

Just look at the crew behind her.

Morricone – Gabriel’s Oboe from The Mission, Maja ?agowska – oboe, conducted by Andrzej Kucyba?a

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FtE3hoR_Nvo

Dr Faustus
Dr Faustus
September 2, 2024 4:33 pm

Is there any information as to exactly how much electricity each renewable project delivers as compared to blurb?

We’ve tried to get it out of AEMO but it’s all hush hush as to actual performance.

It’s a difficult area (as you obviously know) because the various agencies prefer to publish data in aggregate and to obscure performance measures.

The reason for that is simple: the utilisation of installed renewable capacity is shocking – around 25%, or less than 19% if you include the installed GW of gas and storage support in the denominator. An engineering and economic disgrace.

Project by project data is available – Rosetta Analytics provides a useful resource. But you have to do a bit of light Excel work to pull out the performance statistics.

Knuckle Dragger
Knuckle Dragger
September 2, 2024 4:37 pm

Judiciary news – the Hun’s headline:

Fake penis lawyer’s prolific drug use exposed
The highlights:

A criminal barrister accused of trafficking drugs from his Melbourne apartment has been refused bail as the extent of his drug habit was exposed.

‘exposed’. PHRASING.

Anthony Grant, 44, will remain locked up in solitary confinement at Melbourne Assessment Prison after being refused bail for a second time on Monday.

Magistrate Timothy Bourke said Grant, a suspended barrister at Oxen Dixon Chambers, was clearly drug-addicted, outlining a report which showed he consumes methamphetamine, GHB, ecstasy and ketamine on a weekly basis, as well as eight standard drinks a day.

My only quibble with this is the ‘eight standard drinks’ bit. Clearly, this bloke is not having a proper crack.

Mr Grant is facing 13 charges which include trafficking a commercial quantity of 1,4-Butanediol and ketamine following a raid of his $800-a-week Queens Rd apartment in August in which an enormous stash of drugs, mostly prescription, were allegedly uncovered.

Among the items located was a prosthetic penis – which can be used to fake urine drug screens – as well as 355 tablets and 322 jelly packs of the erectile dysfunction medicine Sildenafil, sold as Viagra.

Mr Grant’s defence lawyer previously put to the court there was little evidence of his client trafficking drugs.

Of course his lawyer said that.

Mr Grant previously worked for the Office of Public Prosecutions.

Ah. Ahhhhhhh.

Arky
September 2, 2024 4:38 pm

Those opposing the death penalty I suggest follow the Wade Wilson case in the US.
Particularly his leaked prison phones calls wherein he laughs and jokes with various people about the crimes.
Which were to strangle two women and drive repeatedly over one of them, a young mother, until “she looked like spaghetti”.
The death penalty is the only appropriate sentence for this criminal.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MtxYR6SMADs

Last edited 2 months ago by Arky
Rockdoctor
Rockdoctor
September 2, 2024 4:51 pm

The new mob Muslim Votes Matter, just went down a rabbit hole trying to find out something about their leadership after Michael Smith had something up about them, well absolutely nothing. Hmmm…

Their spokesman has quite a colourful past makes you wonder about the leadership team/organisers and why they are so shy:

https://thenightly.com.au/politics/muslim-votes-matter-spokesman-ghaith-krayem-struck-off-solicitors-roll-c-15671852

Eyrie
Eyrie
September 2, 2024 5:02 pm

A cell, bread and water.
The cell to be equipped with a tall stool and a rope attached to the ceiling with a noose on the end spaced just right, above the stool.

Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 5:39 pm
Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 5:40 pm
Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 5:43 pm

@Holden_Culotta

RFK Jr: “There still has to be a reckoning” for Covid

“The mainstream media hasn’t caught up with the science, but the science is out there now and it’s devastating.”

“Yesterday, the chief attorney for FDA admitted, because he lost a case in court against a doctor, that there was no reason to discourage people from taking Ivermectin.

Ivermectin was a very devastating cure for Covid. It literally obliterated Covid.

By depriving people of Ivermectin, millions of people around the globe died.

There were cures for Covid from day one … but they didn’t want that, they wanted the vaccine only.

There’s a little-known federal rule that they were all aware of which said that you cannot issue an emergency use authorization for a vaccine if there is an existing remedy that has already been approved for any use.

If they admitted that any of them were effective, the whole vaccine project would have fallen apart.

They gave people a product that was not properly tested.

Now, we have a whole generation of kids that got myocarditis, these terrible heart problems in young athletic boys.

You’re seeing so many kids now drop dead on playing fields. We never saw anything like this before.

The average, I think, was 29 a month globally athletes who died on the field, and we’re getting to hundreds a month now.”

Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 5:44 pm
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
September 2, 2024 5:46 pm

Haven’t read much on the Eastern Front, in World War Two, But I’ve just taken delivery of “Endgame 1944 – How Stalin Won the War” by Jonathan Dimbleby.

Operation Bagration began in June 1944, when more then two million Red Army soldiers began an assault along a 1200 mile front, and started the push to Berlin. Bagration destroyed three quarters of Army Group Center’s divisions. Looks interesting!

Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 5:48 pm

@MikeBenzCyber

The “Democracy” Censorship Predicate: A Quick Primer

– After 2016, the national security state, the foreign policy establishment, & the gov’t-funded NGO-plex orgs redefined the word “democracy”: it no longer meant a consensus of individuals, it meant a consensus of institutions

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 5:50 pm

Who would disagree with Oakeshott there, with respect to the points he’s making about vocal imbeciles suggesting taking a piss in public is a “herman” right? I only wished though that we understood enough of ourselves that we didn’t have to stoop to that level.

Oakeshott is saying that overemphasizing free speech clouds the picture with what could be going on with respect to other rights. What he doesn’t mention in your paragraph is that free expression is foundational because you can’t advocate for property rights, the right to life, etc. In other words, free expression is intrinsic to those other rights he speaks of.

“Most men have nothing to say” undervalues the right to free expression. Even if people don’t avail themselves of this right, it says nothing about it’s importance in terms of the security it provides in potentially speaking out or dissenting. As I said, Oakeshott has a concern with the ideological and not the practical.

The End. This time I promise. 
 
 

Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 5:56 pm
Arky
September 2, 2024 6:02 pm

Roger

 September 2, 2024 12:02 pm

 Reply to  Roger

Arky, you complain about the abuse of rights, and rightly so, but there’s an old Latin maxim that translates as “the abuse of a thing does not cancel its proper use” which is useful as a rule.

For example, the abuse of pain killing drugs by hedonists does not mean their use on medicine is no longer valid.

Similarly, those who twist and invent rights to serve their own interests apart from any reference to the good that rights serve to uphold do not make the notion of rights redundant.

I do complain a lot.
But here I only want someone, anyone, to point out the purpose of all this rights talk we have been subjected to and programmed with our entire lives, if the same outcomes could be achieved by insisting people observe their duties and responsibilities.

Last edited 2 months ago by Arky
Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 6:03 pm
Lysander
Lysander
September 2, 2024 6:10 pm

Can all you Cats PLEASE stop using the word “Oakeshott” as it is very triggering for me.

Tony Windsor & Rob Oakeshott Support Labor (youtube.com) (yes, all 26 minutes of his speech endorsing Gillard!!!)

Roger
Roger
September 2, 2024 6:15 pm

Can all you Cats PLEASE stop using the word “Oakeshott” as it is very triggering for me.

As in, “he really made an oakeshott of that speech”?

Bruce of Newcastle
Bruce of Newcastle
September 2, 2024 6:16 pm

Oh noes, we’re going to be short of parrot cage lining.

8 newspapers cease printing in Hunter, New England and North West (Ncl local news, 1 Sep)

There are calls for the state and federal governments to step in and do more to save regional media.

It comes as eight weekly newspapers across New South Wales cease printing – parent company Australian Community Media revealing they’re not sustainable.

Who, you might wish to ask, is Australian Community Media? Well I did as you do and searched

Australian Community Media (ACM) is a media company in Australia responsible for over 160 regional publications. Its mastheads include the Canberra Times, Newcastle Herald

The CanT and the Newcastle Pravda? There you go. Fortunately none of my parrots are in cages since I am entirely sure they wouldn’t see fit to crap on these rags. They have standards.

Lysander
Lysander
September 2, 2024 6:19 pm

Spent two (wasted?) hours watching a docco on YouTube today about a dude called Ron Wyatt who claimed to have found Sodom and Gomorrah (plausible?), the real location of Mt Sinai (semi-plausible), the location of Noah’s Ark (debatable?) but he lost me when he said he found the Ark of the Covenant with Christ’s blood on it.

Interesting side note, he claims he got the blood tested and it came back with only 23 chromosomes…. as in, only the mother’s genes… I don’t buy it but it raises some interesting scientific questions…

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
September 2, 2024 6:21 pm

Speaking of bread, water and a hangman’s noose…
Paul watson’s anti-whaling fight continues from prisonAFP
18 minutes ago

AFP
2 comments
Paul Watson said his ‘ship right now is Prison Nuuk’ as his legal team insist Tokyo has a vendetta against him. Picture: AFP
Anti-whaling activist Paul Watson’s detention in a Greenland prison pending his possible extradition to Japan has not prevented him from continuing his fight to save the animals, he told AFP in an interview.
“If they think it prevents our opposition, I’ve just changed ship. My ship right now is Prison Nuuk,” the 73-year-old US-Canadian campaigner said, a mischievous smile crossing his face as he met with AFP in the visitors’ room of Greenland’s Nuuk Prison.

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 6:22 pm

Really, now lack of storm activity in the Atlantic tropics and the Gulf are indicate climate crisis. This circus needs to go on the road.

The Atlantic tropics are completely broken, unable to produce tropical storms even w/off the charts “climate fueled” oceans. Our models no longer work, forecasters can’t figure it out. This is not normal.

“Climate fueled” oceans no less.

Tom
Tom
September 2, 2024 6:23 pm

Australian Community Media (ACM) is a media company in Australia responsible for over 160 regional publications. Its mastheads include the Canberra Times, Newcastle Herald.

In other words, the former Fairfax regional newspapers, now owned by Nine Entertainment, staffed by loony leftists peddlling loony left political propaganda (like “climate change”), not news.

So of course they’re not sustainable because their “reporting” is rubbish.

Miltonf
Miltonf
September 2, 2024 6:27 pm
Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 6:34 pm

This may have been uploaded before but it’s worth repeating.

The Best Answer Ever Given On Why We Should Vote For Trump.

Last edited 2 months ago by Indolent
Top Ender
Top Ender
September 2, 2024 6:37 pm

Need your help here Cats,

Doing up a cruise liner talk around NZ and eastern Oz, which will have a lot of Americans on board.

Who are our most famous Aussies?

Arky
September 2, 2024 6:37 pm

Roger

 September 2, 2024 6:15 pm

 Reply to  Arky

I’ve already explained that.

Rights frame our duties.

Without the notion of rights (properly defined) people would be likely to multiply duties beyond what is reasonable, good and necessary for our well being.

See if I have this correct.
If everyone wasn’t instructed as to their rights, some might be forced to do more than their fair duty?
That’s why rights are required?
Isn’t this circuitous?
I say we identify the good, and for each good determine who has responsibility, then frame laws around that.

But you’re saying we identify the good, and for each good determine whose right it is, and then determine who is responsible for upholding those rights?
Seems redundant.

calli
calli
September 2, 2024 6:40 pm

I’m enjoying the discussion on rights and responsibilities. It’s like watching an evenly matched tennis tournament.

Just try to resist pegging a shot at this humble ballgrannie.

Tom
Tom
September 2, 2024 6:45 pm

Who are our most famous Aussies?

Top Ender, if it’s for American ears, I’d suggest (in order): our most enduring prime minister Sir Robert Menzies (who helped Sir Winston Churchill win World War Two) our greatest war-fighting soldier Sir John Monash and our greatest Labor prime minister Bob Hawke (a staunch American ally).

John H.
John H.
September 2, 2024 6:47 pm

Interesting side note, he claims he got the blood tested and it came back with only 23 chromosomes…. as in, only the mother’s genes… I don’t buy it but it raises some interesting scientific questions…

Jesus was a woman!? He’s lying.

Steve trickler
Steve trickler
September 2, 2024 7:07 pm

Lysander
September 2, 2024 5:32 pm

Reply to  Steve trickler
I was literally watching this last night!!!

—–

I posted that years ago at Sinc’s. It just pops in the head.

Cheers. All the best.

Miltonf
Miltonf
September 2, 2024 7:08 pm

Robert Reich: ‘Elon Musk Is Out of Control’ and Should Be Threatened with Arrest
Robert Reich: Musk Is ‘Out of Control,’ Should Be Threatened with Arrest (breitbart.com)

Piss off- who the hell do these mediocrities think they are?

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
September 2, 2024 7:25 pm

Famous Australians? Erroll Flynn?

Miltonf
Miltonf
September 2, 2024 7:29 pm

Never been a fan of the Kennedys and I think they’re drawing a long bow…

RFK Jr. Campaign: Choose Trump and ‘Finish the Story’ JFK, RFK Started (breitbart.com)

Maybe LBJ was more of the problem

Bungonia Bee
Bungonia Bee
September 2, 2024 7:38 pm

Greg Sheridan has no answers to the question of Israel versus Hamas and whether the war is productive. The fact is that no halt can be countenanced until Hamas is detsroyed.

Mother Lode
Mother Lode
September 2, 2024 7:40 pm

Piss off- who the hell do these mediocrities think they are?

Mediocrities are far more threatened by talented people than talented people are. In this case we have a mediocre man who thinks, through comical hubris, that his talented people feel loyal to him even though he has nothing to offer except vapid orisons of devotion.

There is a lonely tragedy in people deluding themselves like that because they cannot ever connect with each other because they would have to admit to themselves also that they too are mediocre.

Last edited 2 months ago by Mother Lode
Roger
Roger
September 2, 2024 7:40 pm

The stars have aligned:

Albanese, Dutton & Starmer are all presently enjoying a -13% “approval” rating.

Nay-saying will only take you so far; Dutton needs to find his mojo else we’ll be gifted with a Labor minority government beholden to the Greens & Teals.

Last edited 2 months ago by Roger
Miltonf
Miltonf
September 2, 2024 7:43 pm

Sheridan and Reich are more proof that as far as the politico-meja class is concerned, membership is not open to people with real achievements in the real world.

132andBush
132andBush
September 2, 2024 7:59 pm

Indolent
September 2, 2024 5:40 pm

Miranda Devine

The United Nations is ‘terrified’ of Trump, official admits in undercover video

Crowder aired that the other day with a prediction of how the UN would explain it away, which the UN then dutifully followed.
“The person in question is a lower level functionary whose views are not those of the UN in general blah blah blah”

Crowder hinted strongly that this first bloke was the tip of a very big iceberg so I’m guessing they have some material to come that will not be from lower level functionary types.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
September 2, 2024 8:18 pm

Comment rejected at the Oz for pointing out that the Israeli hostages were murdered, not executed…

Rabz
September 2, 2024 8:19 pm

Shazza Markson “Exclusive”:

Mike “Duelling Banjos” Burgess declares hamarse a terrorist threat to Ozzies.

The man is one of this country’s most piercing intellects.

Yeah, OK, he’s an incompetent imbecile and Albansleazey lickspittle who wouldn’t know if his backside was ablaze.

Exhibit A (cue spookee muzak): (Imaginary) garage nayzees. Everywhere. Coming to a suburb near you!

Aaron
Aaron
September 2, 2024 8:38 pm
Arky
September 2, 2024 8:53 pm

Sticking this here so I can find it again, reply to Roger re: The Abolition of Man.

Arky
 September 2, 2024 8:51 pm

 Reply to  Roger
It boils down to this: “A belief in a dogmatic value is necessary to the very idea of a rule which is not tyrannical”.
And that instinct is not a valid base for morality.
These are precisely the arguments I had with BG and John.
And they are the same arguments which lead me to reject a rights based morality as well.
With a firm grasp of the required dogmatic values, rights aren’t really required are they? They might be implied from those dogmatic values, but they don’t dictate them.

Knowing ‘do unto others” doesn’t require a right to have done to, does it?

Last edited 2 months ago by Arky
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
September 2, 2024 8:58 pm
JC
JC
September 2, 2024 9:11 pm

The problem isn’t that you continue, it’s that you don’t address the counter-argument.


The real problem is that you skirt arguments by trying to introduce new points when the earlier ones don’t work. You do this all the time.

Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
Zulu Kilo Two Alpha
September 2, 2024 9:26 pm

Reading “Do Let’s have Another Drink” by Gareth Russell – “The Singular Wit and Double measures of Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother.”

“One of Elizabeth’s longer lasting friendships was with the playwright Noel Coward…Elizabeth subsequently dispelled any doubt that she knew Coward was gay, when, one evening they passed the tall soldiers of the Household Cavalry, in their gleaming breastplates, lined up on either side of the staircase. Catching Coward staring, Elizabeth whispered, with a smile “I wouldn’t if I were you, Noel. They count them, before they put them out!” (Page 78.)

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 9:31 pm

MatrixTransform

September 2, 2024 9:25 pm

Reply to  JC

are you retarded?

introducing new points is exactly the form of argumentation

I’d take that as an insult, but it’s coming from, you venomous pos. No, there’s no reason to continually be adding new points when the old ones don’t work. You have a serious problem with comprehension, but then it’s no surprise.

Seriously, when was there ever a time you added or introduced a topic other than trolling people and attempting to look smart,

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 9:52 pm

The First Amendment provides several rights protections: to express ideas through speech and the press, to assemble or gather with a group to protest or for other reasons, and to ask the government to fix problems. It also protects the right to religious beliefs and practices. It prevents the government from creating or favoring a religion.

The Second Amendment protects the right to keep and bear arms.

The Third Amendment prevents government from forcing homeowners to allow soldiers to use their homes. Before the Revolutionary War, laws gave British soldiers the right to take over private homes.

The Fourth Amendment bars the government from unreasonable search and seizure of an individual or their private property.

The Fifth Amendment provides several protections for people accused of crimes. It states that serious criminal charges must be started by a grand jury. A person cannot be tried twice for the same offense (double jeopardy) or have property taken away without just compensation. People have the right against self-incrimination and cannot be imprisoned without due process of law (fair procedures and trials).

The Sixth Amendment provides additional protections to people accused of crimes, such as the right to a speedy and public trial, trial by an impartial jury in criminal cases, and to be informed of criminal charges. Witnesses must face the accused, and the accused is allowed his or her own witnesses and to be represented by a lawyer. 

The Seventh Amendment extends the right to a jury trial in Federal civil cases.

The Eighth Amendment bars excessive bail and fines and cruel and unusual punishment.

The Ninth Amendment states that listing specific rights in the Constitution does not mean that people do not have other rights that have not been spelled out.

The Tenth Amendment says that the Federal Government only has those powers delegated in the Constitution. If it isn’t listed, it belongs to the states or to the people.

I’m curious, for those not a “fan of rights”, which of these aren’t you a fan of?

Also, with respect to the second amendment, if it didn’t exist, would any non-fan believe that Americans would continue to possess the right to own guns?

Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 9:55 pm
Indolent
Indolent
September 2, 2024 9:58 pm

@Holden_Culotta

RFK Jr: “My uncle spent the 1,000 days of his administration battling his military apparatus and intelligence agencies to keep the country out of war”

“On October 22, 1963 … he signed National Security Order 263 ordering all military personnel home from Vietnam.

30 days after that, he was killed.

And a week after that, LBJ, his successor, remanded that order and sent 250,000 troops in, then Nixon came in and sent 560,000.

56,000 Americans never came home, including my cousin George Skakel, who died in the Tet Offensive.

Then my father ran five years later against the Vietnam War and was killed after winning the California primary.”

“Three days before my uncle’s inauguration, Eisenhower gave this speech that today stands as one of the most important speeches in American history.

He warned Americans against the emergence of a military-industrial complex that would destroy democracy.”

Arky
September 2, 2024 10:19 pm
Arky
September 2, 2024 10:25 pm

Article 33 All persons holding the nationality of the People’s Republic of China are citizens of the People’s Republic of China.
All citizens of the People’s Republic of China are equal before the law.
The state shall respect and protect human rights.
Every citizen shall?enjoy the rights prescribed by the Constitution and the law and must fulfill the obligations prescribed by the Constitution and the law.
Article 34 All citizens of the People’s Republic of China who have reached the age of 18, regardless of ethnicity, race, gender, occupation, family background, religious belief, level of education, property status?or length of residence,?shall?have the right to vote and stand for election; persons deprived of political rights?in accordance with law?shall?be an exception.
Article 35 Citizens of the People’s Republic of China shall?enjoy freedom of speech, the press, assembly, association, procession?and demonstration.
Article 36 Citizens of the People’s Republic of China shall?enjoy freedom of religious belief.
No state?organ, social organization or individual shall?coerce citizens to believe in or not to believe in any religion, nor shall they discriminate against citizens who believe in or do not believe in any religion.
The state shall?protect normal religious activities. No one shall?use religion to engage in activities that disrupt public order, impair the health of citizens or interfere with the state’s education system.
Religious groups and religious affairs shall not?be subject to?control by foreign forces.
Article 37 The personal freedom of citizens of the People’s Republic of China shall not be violated.
No citizen shall?be arrested unless?with the approval or by the decision of a people’s procuratorate or by the decision of a people’s court, and arrests must be made by a public security organ.
Unlawful detention, or the unlawful deprivation or restriction of a citizen’s personal freedom by other means, is prohibited; the unlawful search of a citizen’s person is prohibited.
Article 38 The personal dignity of citizens of the People’s Republic of China shall not be violated. It is prohibited to use any means to insult, libel or falsely accuse citizens.

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 10:29 pm

I haven’t skirted anything here. I addressed the claim that speech is prior to life (and property) directly at 4.54pm and earlier.

You have indeed done so from your initial remark, to which I responded by showing how a Jew in Germany had no right to exist but nevertheless showed resistance through dissent. It was all downhill from that point on. You seem incapable of acknowledging that you can ever be in error.

Ellie
Ellie
September 2, 2024 10:42 pm

My father died yesterday. Not sure how to feel

KevinM
KevinM
September 2, 2024 10:44 pm

MatrixTransform
September 2, 2024 10:27 pm

Reply to  JC

JC, you are possibly the stupidest person I know.

I wouldn’t say that, but I would never argue with him about anything even about the sun rising in the east.

We had a workmate like him, he was always right about everything even if he hadn’t the faintest clue about the subject.
he would twist and turn and shift the goalposts but never admit being wrong.

Nobody argued with him after a few weeks, you could see him fuming when left out of discussions. Frustrated the crap out of him.

cohenite
September 2, 2024 10:46 pm

 You seem incapable of acknowledging that you can ever be in error.

I never am in error so why should I admit it?

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 10:49 pm

dover0beach

September 2, 2024 10:36 pm

This not a fan of rights talk is not a fan of the idea that determining what is protected by the first amendment, for instance, doesn’t involve recourse to ends. I’m entirely certain that none of the authors of the first amendment nor those that ratified it believe porn or the Church of Satan fell within its protections.

You’re obviously looking for human perfection. Unfortunately, for this, you’ll have to wait until the afterlife because you’re not going to find it on earth.

While I agree they may not have considered lewdness and depravity, Musk still hasn’t been arrested in the US and now is afraid to leave the country for obvious reasons. In fact he sees the US as a haven. Although not for lack of trying, the US constitution has offered protections that aren’t available elsewhere, and there is more of an opportunity there to reverse bullshit with those rights inscribed in their constitution.

How about the right to bear arms?

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 10:52 pm

Trans, remain silent please as you’re not adding anything worthwhile.

cohenite
September 2, 2024 11:00 pm

Trans, remain silent please as you’re not adding anything worthwhile.

I presume you mean me; and that is not true head prefect. Everything I do is worthwhile. I was alluding to the truth paradox:  ‘I always tell lies’, am I telling the truth? Alternatively: I thought I was wrong but I was mistaken. Am I perfect? So, which is it?

cohenite
September 2, 2024 11:10 pm

This is too complicated: here is an army of cute owls:

Arky
September 2, 2024 11:10 pm

if instead of writing a lot of meaningless piffle about rights, which were immediately ignored once Hitler took power, the Weimar Republic had taken steps to instil in it’s people the good of not murdering people, events may have been different.

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 11:13 pm

How is wanting to also talk about ends when talking about rights wanting perfection?

You raised two examples that you believe shouldn’t have been considered as rights to free expression even though the US has, in a relative sense, the most liberal rights to free expression in the world. The glass is perhaps 90% full, and you still stretch out to find fault.

Now answer my question seeing I answered yours (before mine).

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 11:17 pm

When I’ve made a mistake I’ve admitted it. But still, lmao that you would accuse this of anyone yourself.

The Pilko defense was laughable finally devolving that bullshit into calling any rejoinders myths. You of all people making this accusation. Really?

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 11:27 pm

Not at all, but putting that allegation aside, how does that count against my point that protecting life is prior to protecting speech? It doesn’t in the slightest.

I’m surprised you’re even trying to defend this. Protecting life can only be achieved through the demonstration of dissent. How else has this been achieved. it hasn’t been through the goodness of a regime’s heart.

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 11:39 pm

The criticism would have been valid before these decisions, they simply illustrated the problem.

Huh huh, what criticisms were leveled before?

Isn’t the answer obviously, no. If the right to bear arms didn’t exist obviously Americans would not enjoy a right to bear arms.

Obviously. Assuming you support this right, how is not being a fan of rights working out? Are you a partial fan then?

JC
JC
September 2, 2024 11:46 pm

How about the most arcane right of all, that these days may not appear to have much relevance.

The Third Amendment prevents government from forcing homeowners to allow soldiers to use their homes.

A fan, partial fan or not so much?

KevinM
KevinM
September 2, 2024 11:48 pm

Doing the right thing, without compulsion.

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