Check the last couple of hours.
Open Thread – Mon 3 March 2025
- Open Thread – Thurs 27 March 2025
- Open Thread – Mon 24 March 2025
- In Tandem with the Antichrist
- Open Thread – Weekend 22 March 2025
- Open Thread – Thurs 20 March 2025
Today is 28th March. I look forward to my social media feeds being swamped overnight with Tom Brady/Patriots/greatest superbowl comeback…
Thus opening up immigration to anyone from anywhere.
Less than one percent today. I think it’s the general view that there might be a recession. Not sure of…
You reckon the secured lines used in COMSEC are less secure then Signal? Come on. Goldberg’s a neocon. He was…
Hellooooo new thread.
I dedicate this thread to Volodymyr Zelensky and shameless opportunism.
Beaten by the belle
Very nice, Mole.
Foxy Hornbags lead the way.
So.
Went out to one of those globohomo Sculptures By The Bay thingos today. I disagree with them in principle, because shire rates get levied and gifted to these idiots to run the Ministry Of Culture. But, had a guest kid who wanted to go, and a mate had a piece which won a prize, and we all went out for a surf before, so it wasn’t the worst way to round out a morning.
Sculptures were basically 50% CAD and CNC, and 50% flotsam and jetsam woven into eco-icon animals.
There was one big industrial design and construction piece made out of rusty new 3mm steel plates in long, vertically arranged, wavy and tapering slices.
Oh yes, it was a giant, disembodied, hairless vulva.
I might have noted this in the wake of the wall-o-twats at MONA and the dress covered in cartoon hairless m*nges which Gillian Anderson wore… when we excise the female sex organ and put it about in graffito-deep cartoons for public amusement, it’s Fall Of Rome stuff.
I find it very hard to chit-chat about this sort of thing at dinner parties, esp when an education admin mum is boasting about giggling over it with her 17 year old daughter.
Ask her to show hers
‘the female sex organ’? It includes much more than the entrance to it. Hidden mysteries, as the ancient Indo-European cultures used to believe, the story of life itself resides within that entrance, from which emerge human beings. Hence they revered the female vulva, expressed in sculptures of it, as a personified thing, in the stick figure vulvas called the Shiela na Gogs that are occasionally still found … in churches .. in Britain and Ireland. It is something to revere, not to misappropriate into so-called ‘art’ without encompassing the meaning of all that is interior to a woman.
Only crass trannies could see it simply as the entrance to a ‘hole’.
But a Sheila Na Gigh still has a sheila present.
If there are any pieces of note in any sort of significanrt uantity from antiquity depicting nowt but a pudendum, then it’s news to me.
Whereas detatchable penises are all over the shop, not only because they’re all over the adults-only shops. It’s because they stick out in the first place.
I thought I posted this on the old thread as a reply to beaugan’s comment about leftwingers, but it appears to be lost or it didn’t get through.
How would you even know what’s bullshit if you
only read and watch left-wing media? Some left-wingers still believe the “fine people” hoax and that Trump was and is Putin’s lapdog. It was late last year when a few billionaires who turned to support Trump did so after they finally realised that what they had been fed were complete hoaxes. They changed sides because they resented being lied to.
Most people loathe bullshit, but they have to end up realizing they’ve been deceived. That’s not happening with the left, and only a few are escaping the brainwashing. The Right is not entirely in the clear with those who identify as woke right. Fortunately that’s only a small fringe though.
Many many OZ commenters believe Trump is in league with Putin.
Do they actually “believe” it or is it just more “virtue signalling?
What’s the woke right?
Ask Grok as it’s pretty concise.
Hans WAS 100% with this soundtrack.
Hans Zimmer LIVE – Man of Steel
Interstellar is pretty on-point.
Docking Scene
Johannes Leak.
Mark Knight.
Don’t give Anal ideas.
Sleep well lovely people.
Bed for me.
Warren Brown.
Brett Lethbridge.
Michael Ramirez.
LOL !!!
A.F. Branco.
Michael Ramirez #2.
Tom Stiglich.
Al Goodwyn.
Leonarda Jonie on abortions and shootings:
‘…and the women were upset…’
Lisa Benson.
Ben Garrison.
T.W.A.T – Monty Pox Virus? –
Sting in the tail. Love it.
Best clip I’ve seen so far from Shane Gillis on his most recent SNL appearance.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E2YB0WL3dV0
He’s gone from being cancelled to being on the show twice in a year.
Hah! The Norwegian Government has stated that, Norway will continue to refuel US warships. The Oil Company that threw a tanty has been sorted by the Government. Lol.
https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2025/03/02/norway-vows-to-continue-supplying-fuel-to-u-s-navy-after-companys-call-for-boycott/
Not the first time the Norwegians have got a bit big for their britches.
Freighter Tampa was Norwegian. That time they got an SAS team for their troubles.
As you were.
Just further to gallant despot Der Sturmer and his government’s noble support of clown Zelesnky, never forget that this is the same Der Sturmer who’s been busy locking up indigenous English men and women for mean tweets. And also don’t forget how every every night, on the beaches of south-east England, hundreds of adult Muslim and sub-Saharan males arrive illegally in rubber boats. Der Sturmer’s government has done nothing to curb this invasion (and invasion it is).
As David Starkey, Britain’s most eminent historian has said overnight…..
‘Starmer can’t even defend Kent let alone Kiev’.
Beset with huge domestic problems……Islamist terrorism, rampant immigration (mainly from Muslim countries), stagnant economies, and restless and furious populaces, Western Europe’s leaders think they can use Ukraine as a deflection from their woeful domestic realities.
Nup, this will add to their problems. I used to think France would be the first Western country to blow up but now I am sure it will be the UK.
Correct.
Will report back. We are going over there again in September.
Why? let them suffer in silence.
Dunno. Masochism maybe.
I am a proud Celto-Saxon indigenous woman of Britain.
Maybe that’s why. Inexorably drawn to the place.
Military History – Bismarck Sea Snippet IV.
Superior Private Ogino, Seiichi was a member of the 21st Independent Mixed Brigade (Yamagata) Artillery, Yamada Battalion (Lt. Col. Yamada, Taro), No. 3 (Lt. Takata, Hiyoshi) Company. Born on the 11th of November, 1917, he had been a clerk in a trading company in pre-war life, from Hyogo Ken, Muko Gun, Koto Mura, Kaze Kawa, 2034. He was also a Christian. Upon capture, Ogino was five feet two inches in height and weighed 110lbs, had black hair and brown eyes. He was unmarried.
His Prisoner of War records provide two dates for his capture, but it is likely the first date – the 21st of March ’43 – is the correct one. Ogino was captured somewhere ‘off [the] Trobriand Is.’ When first interrogated, he gave a false surname, but later corrected this deception, and it is possible he assisted the Allied Translation and Interpreter Service (ATIS) in some formal manner, for there is a 2-year gap in his PoW documents, at the end of which he was transferred to U.S. Custody (United States Army Forces in the Far East: USAFFE). (Almost all other Prisoners of War had their PoW Camp location and dates listed, but not Ogino, aside from his initial camp at Gaythorne, Brisbane. It is unusual he was not transferred to Cowra or Hay, N.S.W., where the vast majority of Japanese PoWs were held. On at least four pages of his file, he seems to have signed his name in English, which was also unusual).
According to the extracts from reports of his interrogation, Ogino was an observant soldier for his rank, for he claimed to have overheard “various differences of opinion amongst high-ranking officers regarding arrangements for protection” from the air prior to embarkation from Rabaul. Ogino also stated that the convoy had been spotted by an enemy aircraft on the 1st of March, and that that night the course was altered and the ships circled close to land – likely to have been Western New Britain – due to indecision about whether or not to continue. Exactly how a lowly private would have been in proximity to the key decision makers on both these occasions is not answered.
Ogino, however, was aboard the merchant vessel/transport Oigawa Maru, which hit and set ablaze at about 0900 hours on the morning of the 3rd of March. At least one bomb entered the engine room ‘damaging boilers and steam mains’ and the order to abandon ship was given, though the Oigawa Maru did not sink until at least ten hours later on some accounts, and perhaps not until the very early hours of the following morning. It is believed that another direct was made on her before she finally sank, and possibly by a Japanese aircraft, according to witnesses.
Insufficient steam pressure to work the winches used for lowering the MLC (Military Landing Craft – barges) – which had been unlashed in preparation for this emergency the previous day, meant that only two-sectional collapsible landing craft and rafts were available for those not killed or wounded in the initial air attacks.
A nearby destroyer which Ogino was unable to identify, sped off at great speed rather than rescue the Oigawa Maru’s survivors in the water, which was greatly resented by the latter. This vessel, however, was observed to have been sunk during the following wave of Allied attacks.
It is not known what Ogino, Seiichi’s fate was after he was transferred to the American forces in June, 1945.
Postscript: Of those Japanese killed in the Cowra PoW Breakout in August, 1944, a substantial number were survivors of Operation 81/the Bismarck Convoy Disaster.
More signs that Blinken, Nuland, and Vindman encouraged Zelensky to do what he did.
Zelensky’s Terrible, Horrible, Very Bad, No Good Day (2 Mar)
By Clarice Feldman (via Powerline)
Ms Feldman is always excellent so if she thinks they put him up to it then it appears pretty likely that’s what happened. And that would further explain the outcome…if Trump and Vance were briefed of that beforehand.
Her analysis is the same as mine.
Another factor she doesn’t mention: Z may have doubts about the value of the minerals agreement in practice because he was the one who claimed they existed. And they may not, or not in the quantities advertised. So the Ukraine may not wind up full of American bizoids after all.
He also had a meeting with Democrat and NeverTrump senators
I pointed this out in the Oz and someone responded that is was a bi partisan meeting of senators.FMD About 12 democrats and 2-3 Republican never Trumpers is bi partisan.
The Guardian’s Adam Morton has a lengthy piece on WA’s renewable energy problems – trouble in getting investment in the proposed projects, increasing costs of major projects and a looming deadline set to turn off coal fired plants that is unlikely to be met and would see the state’s lights go out unless the “plan” is adjusted. What to do. More gas, extend coal-fired power? And this in the run-up to an election. Given the lefty bias of the Guardian it is not surprising that Morton goes relatively soft on Labor and spins into criticism of the Coalition’s energy “policy”. Nowhere does he mention the futility of the whole renewables endeavor, given that Net Zero is a dead duck since the USA has pulled out and China and India are building coal and gas plants with gay abandon.( link not provided in this version as problems in accepting on Cat).
Good morning mem.
I followed your link to the start of Adam’s Cat. Had a very happy hour reading through the comments.
It is very sad that, what started out with so much promise has descended into a stinking cesspit of anti-semitism and all round hatred for the basic rights and good things we hold dear.
Yes, I found it interesting too but have now cleared the link.
WA SWIS has no interconnectors. Nowhere to hide. Expect it has higher penetration of gas than the NEM, much of it open cycle peakers.
Morton’s article has more detail on figures etc. You can find it through a Google search and is worth reading.(PS I get the feeling that he has twigged on the debacle.)
aka ‘Islanding’ … ask Broken Hill how that works out, or better still, SA – after the wind blows down the interconnectors….
…. trouble in getting investment in the proposed projects, increasing costs of major projects and a looming deadline set to turn off coal fired plants …..
Why not just mandate it by government fiat, same as every other stupid unicorn fart scheme of government?
Just like Australia’s doomed, leaderless regime of overgrown campus radicals in its last months of existence.
Describes them perfectly Tom. Despicable trash.
Waahhh!
United Nations Chief Warns Of Global Funding Crisis Due To US Cuts (3 Mar)
Vulnerable people like Hamas eh, who you’ve been financing through UNRWA. Or helping Hezbollah by letting them use UNIFIL sites as human shields? No I can’t say Mr Guterres that I’m especially disappointed that you have to cut your budget.
A smart man like Antonio ought to be able to figure out that if you rely on someone for funding you would want to keep them sweet. I can only shake my head at the current crop of “diplomats”.
And over and above the usual US “contributions”, how much USAID money has also disappeared?
How to win votes & influence people .. !
Got a msg from my daughter in Melbourne this morning ..
She took the kids to an open day on a navy ship yesterday (didn’t name the ship) pix looks like a destroyer/frigate anywayz it has biggish guns (important when your a kiddie) … LOL!
Anywayz, queued for an hour, rushed thru by escort(s) and only allowed to see one deck ….. lotza disappointed kids all around …..
If your not gonna let the kids see the bloody thing don’t let ’em on it .. FFS!
You will be able to identify the ship by its pennant number.
Surely, in our modern navy, its how the ship itself identifies that matters?
Well, it might want to identify as:
Boat, Gravy
or its
NSN
or its
NIIN
Hat Khaki Fur Felt…no not that one, that is a slouch hat.
HMAS Arunta, may have been tracking Chinese armada at one stage.
So who’s out there now in the southern ocean watching them?
https://www.navy.gov.au/community-engagement/events/2025-03-02/hmas-arunta-open-day
When the first DDG arrived Brisbane in the 1960s, there were multiple open days, and most of the ship was open to just wander through, with sailors available in some compartments to answer questions.
Last time I took the kids to one at Garden Island (Canberra, I think, the supply ship) .. You could wander where ever .. no restrictions .. crew on hand ……
You might want to tell them next time modern naval vessels* usually only have one gun – for naval fire support onto land targets. The main armament is missiles.
Have a look for the CIWS – Close-In Weapons System. They shoot down incoming missiles and any aircraft silly enough to come close.
(* unless they are a replenishment vessel in which case they don’t mount offensive weapons)
Trivia: CIWS was Australian invention!
I believe General Dynamics might disagree with you there. CIWS is a gattling gun system that uses depleted plutonium in the rounds to give them mass behind the titanium spike. That alone excludes our involvement.
Nulka, hovering rocket flight dynamics was Australian developed, but the payload remains US and NOFORN technical details.
Just like Australia’s doomed, leaderless regime of overgrown campus radicals in its last months of existence.
I hope you’re right but I fear a Labor minority government propped by the Australian Nazi Party (Greens) and Teal whores.
I was told on the weekend that the Teal might win Bradfield.
They have lots of funding. The teal in Cowper claims she is independent but no independent has money to splash around like her. On one evening on sky I saw multiple ads. She has multiple billboards around the electorate that have been up for months. Money galore. But it’s not a party.
Same with one Suzie Holt here in Groom.
Eyrie, the EDO have ‘dropped’ their court case against Qld Government on the issuing of the water licence at Acland coal mine.
Sister is driving coal trucks out there at the moment and said that EDO rang the mine ‘would you mind if we dropped the court case?’
‘We dont mind if you drop it..go right ahead.’
EDO having cash problems after having to payout Santos 9mill in a court case they lost.
Just the same with the teal in Kooyong. However I’m heartened by seeing a lot more banners for the liberal candidate on people’s homes (i.e. not paid advertising space) as I get around the area.
The only signs I am seeing here in Fairfax are Teals, there are a few ALP core flutes around.
Say his name three times in your best braw bricht moonlicht nicht accent without sniggering.
That’s nothing on the name of the South Korean foreign minister assassinated by North Korea in the 1982 Rangoon bombings: His Excellency Mr Lee Bum Suk.
Here’s the present generation and load of WA grid.
https://www.nem-watch.info/widgets/reneweconomy/
Confirms much higher use of gas. This was a result of the take-or-pay contracts as a result of the NWS gas and DBNGP pipeline. Later it was a deliberate policy to reduce fuel source dependency and promote price arbitrage. Less scope to reduce the risk of wind droughts as SW WA typically falls under a single weather system. A pure folly. Real King Canute stuff.
I’ve read the uk press regarding volodomir going to Europe for support. It’s funny but it appears the basis for EU support is a ceasefire or some sort of armistice. Boots on the ground to support this but not a war. But they want a US security guarantee. Last I saw in trumps office Ukraine doesn’t want a ceasefire or peace. It wants to win.
who is actually listening here??
Europeans have that guarantee now and think they will always have it no matter how badly they work against the interests of the guarantor. Their arrogance is staggering that they can’t imagine that they may lose it if they misbehave. What are these people smoking?
The USA has a long history of isolationism from Europe…. Herr Sturmer etc al might benefit from knowing that.
@catturd2
Don’t worry UK Citizens, while this commie clown is sending your sons to die in Ukraine, he’ll be arresting you for complaining about it back home, while letting gang rapists go free. Enjoy your great leader.
Starmer used the phrase “coalition of the willing”.
Pure acid to the ear.
@SecDef
I am now directing each member of the department’s civilian federal workforce to provide 5 bullets of what they accomplished last week and comply with OPM’s email directive.
What are the rules here.
If UK or any other NATO troops go to Ukraine and then end up dead, what are the obligations of other members?
It’s walking and talking like a trap to get US forces involved.
Zero.
If France or the UK send troops to Ukraine it’s on them.
But the bizarre thing is that a lot of people think the US has some NATO-linked obligation to the Ukraine.
A clown just rang 3AW to proclaim that the US has a NATO obligation to send troops to Ukraine.
Tom Elliot informs said caller that Ukraine isn’t a NATO member.
Caller: “But he wants to be a member of NATO!”
FMD.
I think that was the trap.
Gain admission to NATO then bung on a shitshow with Pukin.
Trump and the USA generally I’d reckon have had a gutful of NAYO. They pay 16% of its costs and where has it got them?
I expect the US to exempt this peace keeping action from the NATO treaty. It would be ridiculous no to.
@DavidSacks
WHY ZELENSKY CANNOT MAKE PEACE
Zelensky’s meltdown in the Oval Office began over his refusal to accept a negotiated settlement to the war. Even the Vice President’s use of the word “diplomacy” provoked a heated response.
So why can’t Zelensky make a peace deal?
1) He will lose power.
Zelensky cancelled elections in Ukraine and remains in power through martial law. Despite what USAID propaganda polls may claim, Zelensky is unpopular in Ukraine and would likely lose a fair election. That could leave him vulnerable to retaliation from political opponents he has imprisoned or seized assets from. In short, Zelensky needs the war to justify his continued rule.
2) The gravy train will end.
Ukraine was widely acknowledged as the most corrupt country in Europe before the war, and there is abundant evidence that Ukrainian elites have been hugely profiting from the billions in Western aid. If the war ends, so does the gravy train. A post-war audit of where the money went would also be disastrous for Zelensky’s supporters.
3) He fears the ultra-nationalists.
Most Ukrainians say they want the war to end, but the ultra-nationalist faction (a relative minority but well-armed and willing to use violence to achieve their ends) refuses to accept any territorial concessions to Russia. If Zelensky signs such a deal, he has reason to fear for his safety.
4) He’s psychologically committed.
Zelensky’s belief in ultimate victory over Russia has “hardened into a form that worries some of his advisors,” according to a report by TIME Magazine, which described Zelensky’s faith as “immovable, verging on the messianic.” According to one of Zelensky’s aides, “He is delusional. We’re out of options. We’re not winning. But try telling him that.” Zelensky may be in too deep to see the situation objectively.
5) History will judge him harshly.
Zelensky could have accepted a draft peace deal signed in the first month of the war, the Istanbul Accords, under which Ukraine would have kept all of its territory in exchange for neutrality. A deal now will likely be modeled on Istanbul but require Ukraine to recognize realities on the ground (ie loss of territory). Acknowledging that hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians have died only to get a worse deal may be too bitter a pill for Zelensky to swallow, now or ever.
In summary, Zelensky has powerful motivations to reject a deal, no matter how bad the battlefield realities get. His incentive is to continue a doomed war even if it leads to the complete destruction of Ukraine.
Instead of offering unconditional support, Zelensky’s supporters in the West should be urging him to seek a diplomatic off-ramp. Certainly they should stop catering to his unrealistic and maximalist demands.
As Solzhenitsyn said, the yes-man is your enemy, but a friend will argue with you.
Excellent observations. That he is incapable of recognising he is an utterly discredited warmongering li’l corruptocrat isn’t helping.
Mysterious fatal accident time is long overdue.
@mschlapp
I learned more about Zelensky yesterday than I did in the last 4 yrs. Media told us he is a popular, brave, humble leader. Instead I saw a little, cocky, spoiled actor pretending to be a military leader w fatigues. Americans are generous but we have done our share. Europe needs to put up or shut up.
A little Clown. A First Class BOZO.
@atensnut
Marco Rubio just schooled George Stephanopoulos.
@ggreenwald
It’s so easy to sit in European capitals or nice US TV studios and cheer war in Ukraine all to derive a feeling of purpose and self-esteem, because those being sent to die are not them but Ukrainians violently dragged off the street and sent as cannon fodder on the front lines:
Not good enough.
@amuse
POETIC JUSTICE: The DOJ prosecutors that turned J6 misdemeanors into felonies, have been transferred to units that exclusively handle misdemeanors.
The ‘Duk in 2018:
Bitcoin is a strategic asset which will go to a million dollars
The Donald overnight:
Bitcoin jumped 11% overnight
@elonmusk
The EU leaders and Zelensky having fancy dinners while men die in trenches.
How many parents will never see their son again?
How many children will never see their father?
I did ask my local federal member, Garth Hamilton, how he and his colleagues in Parliament slept at night over their support of Ukraine.
I guess you don’t need a conscience to be a politician.
In these parts, it appears to be a distinct negative.
Elon talking about children not seeing their father, LOL. He has 14 kids, barely sees any of them.
At least the milko looks after his.
..but he’s pretty confident in his DNA.
And you know that for certain how??
@TheMagaKing2_0
George Bush let Putin invade Georgia.
Barack Obama let Putin take Crimea.
Joe Biden let Putin invade Ukraine.
Donald Trump didn’t let Putin do a damn thing.
So who’s the Russian asset now?
@DesireeAmerica4
Fauci: Misled Americans, locked down the country, and wrecked lives with his “trust the science” nonsense.
Zelensky: Forcibly conscripting soldiers, silencing the press in Ukraine, and losing track of $100 billion.
Both were used to manipulate the public—at least Fauci didn’t storm the Oval Office dressed like a Call of Duty skin, demanding endless cash.
Fauci probably has a higher body count…
Fauci lied to Congress as well. In the Slammer he goes. Only a matter of time.
Michael Shellenberger. Really very good.
@RepMTG
Every word of this.
Thomas Cole painting, love this series.
I go to see it in Washington DC every time I visit. The 4 paintings in the series have their own room there.
Thanks…
I’m going to feature the series this month. They really are excellent paintings.
I think they’re rubbish.
Are we sure he didn’t say coalition of the killing?
Coalition of the Swilling. All those grasping snouts in the trough.
Labore are toast. The polling on the weekend that predicts them losing seven to eight seats in Disasterstan alone, means they’re gone.
It will Yabbott style landslide territory.
I hope you are right.
Wiv ya Rabz. Rowan Dean has been calling it for yonks.
At the risk of beating my own drum (gets out drumsticks) so have I. Has the potential to be of post Gillardian proportions.
What a shame we wont have a Liberal party in government when Dutton wins 🙁
The Senate will still be the Star Wars cantina even if this happens , unfortunately
Almost inevitable result of proportional representation, especially with tiny quotas from pissant States. Final Senate seat little better than a lottery in many instances.
@thefernandocz
Elon Musk’s pod with Rogan yesterday is mind-blowing.
They discussed:
• The chances of Musk being assassinated
• Who’s really protecting the Epstein files
• Why AI could end humanity by 2030
Let me save you 3 hours — here are the 12 most important things they talked about
Worth watching in short form and long form.
Woke Boston Mayor’s shocking words after knifeman was killed by off-duty cop while trying to stab two
Norway says it will keep supplying fuel to US navy after company calls for boycott
One for Albo and Marles…
Khamenei: ‘Ukraine proves US support for puppet regimes is illusory’ (2 Mar)
It’s trolling of course but at least Israel can defend themselves. We cannot.
Wonderful to see mUttley back with his usual genius level observations about matters political, e.g. Prez Fatty Trump and the Musk putin’ USAID to the sword.
If the “funding” of transgender midget puppet theatres in Guatemala doesn’t scream “projection of US soft power” then it’s a mystery as to what would.
Clown World.
Guterres at the UN seems to imply that the world will fall apart without this sort of US input as the funding is withdrawn from woke projects.
Bring it on.
Illustrates the poisonous fantasy world that is the modern left. Like a Dali painting
The whole Zelensky in the White House debacle reminded me of the Cold War expression realpolitik. It dealt with the possible not so much the desirable. Politicians and diplomats had to face reality and work from there.
The current crop of European and most Western politicians seems to have either slept through the Cold War or were too young when it was going on so have no idea of the natural law of power politics.
The only leaders with the knowledge of power politics are Trump, Xi, Little Kim and Eastern European leaders, all current or former communists except for Trump. I suspect that Trump had an idea of how it worked even before he got into politics as both his first and current wife are Eastern Europeans. By the way, Western Europeans have the same condescending attitude to Eastern Europeans* as they do to Americans.
*I have heard from European relatives that personnel, helpers and assistants in the German aged care sector are from Eastern Europe countries, mostly from Poland. The so-called refugees do not work.
Speccie just arrived with a range of views on this week’s Trump entertainment program. Rebecca Weisser goes full bore attack mode, Trump is ahistorical and is going to produce a reduced America allowing Putin to do a carve up, while Starmer and the Euros are the good guys. Ramesh Thakur says that Trump has belled the cat, and Euros should be realistic, while Jason Thomas says this new world is ‘no world for old crybabies’ like Security Conference Chairman Heusgen, ‘crying after an intellectual spanking by US Vice President JD Vance’. The UK section of the Speccie starts by noting a new ‘age of realism’ and ends saying Starmer ‘has shown himself ready to meet its new challenges with grim resolution’ for which he ‘deserves, credit, praise and our support’. Trump’s certainly got them all whirring around like frantic ants in a nest suddenly disturbed.
I was just saying to my husband over lunch today how many of our friends and former colleagues are losing their critical and physical capacities as they reach later years after being interesting people.
Trump seems to have recognised this inevitability, and brought in a whole generation well under his age who have new capabilities, unlike the sceloritc old world of Western Europe.
Very perceptive and an extremely good idea.
The Australian Human Rights Commission wants schools to rename their annual multicultural festivities on March 21 the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination –
story in today’s Oz, backed up by Greg Craven, former vice-chancellor of the Australian Catholic University, to quote
The de-harmonisation of Harmony Day is the solemn proposal of the Australian Human Rights Commission, a body that exists to promote civil rights and pay its commissioners and staff healthy remuneration….. This is the ponderously named – but for leftie lawyers perennially remunerative – United Nations Declaration for the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination.
Trips off the tongue, doesn’t it? Particularly for six-year-olds at the local primary school who are trying to enjoy the customs of other communities by wearing papier mâché hats and costumes put together from paper bags and sticky tape.
Ha. Almost worth buying the rag.
The AHRC seems to’ve been weirdly quiet ever since the antisemitism rally at the Opera House. It’s a mystery.
Oh. He’s popped up again.
You’d think after 60/40 he’d keep his head below the parapet.
I often read it free at the Customs House Library at Half Circular Quay, Sydney. The AFR and Daily Tele as well.
Grok:
Nonsense concept. Any politically active force whether left or right is going to have greivances, is going to have its own in-group, and is going to imagine itself morally superior to its opponent. That is just politics.
The interesting question about ‘woke right’ isn’t the concept, but why it was deployed.
I agree, Dover. There is a difference between nonsense and fundamental truth. Expressing those truths in ways that people understand is in no way similar to the Leftie “woke” authoritarianism.
Argue with Grok. Grok will consider your arguments and adapt it reasoning.
With due respect, Dover. In my opinion – not all – but a decent swag of those descriptors would now apply to your current ideological position.
For instance: the moral superiority one is a classic example. How often do you dismiss the opinions of others with simple ad hom?
Did you read what I wrote? Those descriptors apply to most people engaged in politics. That is why it is worthless.
And again, actually doing what you accuse others of.
The concept of “woke right” is just another path on the Long March by the Left, undermining everything that stands in its way.
Brittany Higgins gives birth to first childBrittany Higgins has given birth to her first child with husband David Sharaz. See the photos.
From the Hun. Doesn’t that just make your day? Naah, me neither.
Poor little bugger.
No luv for Knickerless but as long as he’s a “happy chappie” good luck to them ..!
9 months from the romp on the Minister’s couch?
The African elephant has a gestation period of 22 months. Even ole Britts is longer than that.
It’s child abuse allowing feminists to raise any children – let alone sons.
You can bet your house that he will end up being trans.
It will be an adult before this is finished.
If the loony left in USA had run the country as well as they organise anti-Vance demos – see news from Vermont – they wouldn’t lose elections.
Writer’s block !
It’s been just over a year since I last did a movie post.
In the last few weeks I’ve tried to write on a couple of topics (I did attempt one for Gene Hackman) but too no avail.
I seem to be overcome by a sense of hopelessness that it all seems rather pointless and insignificant, especially as I have no love at all for the current state of film, and the current state of politics/culture in Australia and the Western world is one of decay and self-destruction.
Any suggestions ?
Get a good bottle of red. Your strong opinions will come back suddenly. That is why Noah planted a vineyard immediately after da flood. ( reference: Torah)
A good single malt will do the job quicker:)
I think you have excellent instincts, Wolfman. Your brain is just telling you to take a break from writing about films. A time-out will allow you to rediscover what you really like about the medium.
How about the Silent Films – Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, etc, etc…….?
Hundreds of Beavers stupidly funny
The death of Disney.
Watched Tron on the way over to Bali. How good was that movie? My kids loved it back in the day.
Write a review of your ideal, yet to be produced movie, encompassing all the features of quality, engrossing cinema. Better still, create the ultimate screenplay.
As your past posts display, you certainly have the writing skills for either.
She Came To Me (recent, Anne Hathaway’s turn is worth a look). The current release of the 4k restoration of The Fall (you could ask yourself, was it really ever any good? Yes/No). The Last Showgirl (critic palaver and girl acting aside – is it what it appears to be; Pamela’s real beginning?). In review, ‘Why the original cinema release cut of Blade Runner is the true story. And why the sequel was a crime against cinema.’ Tequila Sunrise. Yes, the scene with Kurt on the top of the dunes while Mel & Michelle frolic in the surf is peak mid-80s. The Quiet Ones (Denmark, pending release) – I read all the reviews but this is what I thought. Bruschetta on Turkish at my local premium cinema – review – worth the trip or I really should be helping out in the kitchen. > Wolfman – the ball is in your court. (I’ll literally read just about anything on cinema.)
Maybe write a review of just that.
How the entire fillem industry lost it’s way.
Side point – how long since any of us have (voluntarily) gone to the cinema to watch an Australian film?
I dont remember, but I have watched some Aussie things on netflix.
Saw Gallipoli. Great Film.
They’re a Weird Mob.
(Last time I went to the Cinema to watch an Australian Film.)
Winston, saw They’re a Weird Mob at the Inverell cinema some time in the early to mid 70s. Have it on DVD and still watch it occasionally for nostalgia.
Have you seen the follow up?
It is not a sequel, but written by the same author as They’re a Weird Mob.
Squeeze a Flower.
It’s a very fun and sweet Aussie film.
Have you reviewed any of Scorsese’s films? The Age of Innocence is a favourite but he has many others. How about Michael Mann? Last of the Mohicans, Heat, Collateral are classics. You could treat them individually or a cover the director’s filmography.
You too?
But the light at the end of the tunnel is that Australia will one day find itself in the gutter, covered in vomit and blood, and instead of asking itself where the nearest Early Opener is, will ask instead “How the Hell did I get here?”
Wolfman, my two Arthurian articles on Academia.com are getting a lot of hits, seems as though it is from word of mouth as well as other searches, from the info they send me. I get email enquiries too and asked to join in related Zoom conferences. So the interest is there, an audience gathers, but I am lately just so overwhelmed by a number of family matters, each of considerable gravity, and enjoy a travel-besotted husband (I don’t mind that though, perhaps I encourage it as a form of escape), that I just don’t have the writing feelings. I tell myself they will return when I am ready and rested.
Perhaps that is so with you too. I pushed myself to write travelogues from our recent trip, to keep up a writerly enthusiasm, but even those simple pieces I feel like putting off in future.
Perhaps it is age, these feelings that it doesn’t really matter any more.
You aren’t alone, Wolfie. I have given up on film, and am having such difficulty finding good books of fiction or non-fiction that I am now re-reading past favourites and searching out lost authors.
If I see another title by a young woman “writer” with obligatory multi gender or such characters directing the plot, I will begin advocating for book-burning.
As for art gallery visits, those are becoming a thing of the past, as new work is either lacking all technique in favour of “wall art,” or just another version of learned indigenuous pointillism.
We were just talking about these things today over lunch, thoughts about the decline of creativity from something like a human mind or soul that is about beauty or emotion, to the type of techno art that comes from a machine.
Someone should chain him to a wind turbine and leave him there.
‘Sowing the seeds of hatred’: Aussie rocker Peter Garrett slammed after taunting billionaire Gina Rinehart at Perth Festival (Tele, 3 Mar, not paywalled)
I think Altar Egos would be a better name since he’s obviously a fervent supporter of the green religion and has an ego the size of the planet. I wonder what the parents of those poor tradies he fried think of him?
He’ll have to dig out his sorry costume.
Wanker.
Rog, I’m shocked, language. Anyway the big chrome-dome has nothing to wank.
What happens to these coots is that after every performance they are mobbed by fans saying how wonderful they are. The people who didn’t like the performance never say anything. So their ego grows. With endless and constant praise they become gods. It is as old as the “you are a man not a god”. As they are irreligious there is nothing to look up to except themselves.
Let me guess. His show was lit up using renewable? At night? He was using loads of gas and coal to make money. A typical green commie hypocrite.
Tim Blair: “Garrett dances like an epileptic experiencing a grand mal seizure while attempting to play table tennis with both hands.”
What’s this old fossil doing playing music again? He belongs in Albo’s cabinet fighting Tories with all the other campus radicals.
Was my thought too. Even Barnesy is shade of his former self.
Geriatric rock for tired old Boomers drinking warm Chardonnay from plastic cups.
Unkind souls are echoing Caissies comment “What if a right wing singer, said the same about a left wing woman?”
Garrett is one of the most loathsome poisonous individuals I know of. What is it about north shore lefties?
The media are downplaying Garret’s intent.
“Dance on her grave” is a serious threat, not “sledging”, “taunting”, “a jibe” or “a major dig”.
He’s loathsome but so are the writers who go soft on condemnation.
Growls and calls it singing.
Chris Smith has Ross Cameron and the ukrainian ambassador on. The ambassador is speaking from zelensky’s playbook: war/grievance, war/grievance, war/grievance. On top on this the Eurotrash is now talking about NATO boots on the ground in Ukraine; an actual threat to puttie; these are the same guys who started 2 World Wars.
Compare with Trump who wanted to go into Ukraine for business reasons with an implied threat while revitalising ukraine but conceding the Russian populated Donbas region.
We’re fuked.
Bloody hell the warmongers and fruitcakes are out in force at the Oz.One guy wants Charles to invite Melania instead of Trump and keep her in UK.This will apparently lead to the breakdown of the marriage and Trump’s downfall.I keep pointing out that most of the world couldnt give a toss about this conflict i.e. Africa Asia and south America.
Yes, the letters page had full on TDS happening this morning. Nothing at all with any nuance.
Is joke.
I gather there’s a thaw expected, so why would Poots give the Ukies the opportunity to make the most of their sealed roads behind the contact line to push forward men and materiel unhindered, while his are wading through glug?
SC Reviews:
UKRAINE IS DONE AFTER TRUMP WRECKED EUROTRASH BEGGAR
Big demo in Cairns over “youth crime”. The left couldn’t have organised this better, however the steps take time and dedication!
And any youths rescued by scholarships to good schools in town or city are labelled “new stolen generation”.
The situation now affects a lot of country towns and cities that didn’t have a problem back when I was growing up. It really got its start during the late 1960s and Whitlam era, with the Wave Hill walk-off and demands for commensurate wages. Land rights were on the agendum, and that hasn’t made much difference if any.
Very little on the rally outside paywall.
Yes we are well past needing laws to enshrine the right to self defence inside our homes.
Edit: Just found this though:
https://bree4barronriver.com.au/2025/03/we-have-had-enough-cairns-crime-rally/
Valentina Zharkova: Grand solar minimum is underway | Tom Nelson Pod #278
00:00 Introduction to Valentina Zharkova and Solar Activity
00:35 Understanding the Solar Cycle and Sunspots
04:22 Challenges in Measuring Sunspot Activity
05:06 Discovering the Background Magnetic Field
05:56 Analyzing Magnetic Waves and Principal Component Analysis
07:42 Predicting Solar Activity with Eigenvectors
14:43 Grand Solar Minimum and Historical Solar Cycles
27:27 Implications of the Grand Solar Minimum
37:58 CO2 and Temperature Correlation
39:15 Solar Cycles and Earth’s Temperature
42:41 Solar Inertial Motion and Climate Impact
48:18 Future Climate Predictions
01:05:17 Volcanic Activity and Climate
01:07:33 Earth’s Magnetic Field and Solar Influence
01:12:11 Concluding Thoughts and Future Research
The year I was born.
Richard Clapton – Girls On The Avenue (1975)
I saw Richard Clapton preform that song LIVE!
A friend’s sister was Clapton’s girlfriend.
Now I feel really old. 🙂
I recall when his child fell to their death through an open window. We had a similar window in our bedroom which, unbelievably, could be opened with minimal safety features. We had it replaced as soon after the incident. I still can’t understand why windows that can open sideways like a regular door would be installed in multilevel buildings.
Wrong Clapton, JC. That was Eric, poor man.
Richard – Aussie, face like dropped pie. Great musician.
Oh. Same difference anyway. 🙂
“face like a dropped pie” Murialli, you’re terrible! I saw him about 2 years ago in Queenscliff, he’s had a few pies over the years, played that song to finish, still got it.
Someone at the Oz wants us to petition Charles for nuclear weapons.I said that he will get back to you after Ramadan.No way that gets through is my bet.
King UpChuck has turned me into an anti-monarchist.
Fraid so, Megan. He doesn’t have the political nous of his mother, that is for sure. She wouldn’t have laughed like Charles did when Lydia Thorpe was protesting parliament. (True dat, very funny) but that aside, I think he is a very kind man but too weak for the job.
Or maybe I expect too much now we have Trump for an example.
@MarioNawfal
U.S. SOCIAL SECURITY PAYMENTS SENT TO UKRAINE—WHY?
Newly surfaced federal spending records show direct Social Security payments—totaling millions of dollars—being sent to recipients in Ukraine under retirement insurance programs.
Are American taxpayer dollars funding “retirees” in a war zone? The Social Security Administration (SSA) needs to explain how Ukraine became a recipient of U.S. retirement funds while Americans struggle.
American expats, esp. from their large Ukrainian population (est, 1m+).
US social security payments go to recipients all over the world who’ve qualified for them.
Possibly legit.
Didn’t someone here (JC?) say he is getting a US SS payment whilst resident in Straya?
areff.
Yeah, that’s what I thought too, Sanchez. The rule is that if you’ve worked eggsactly 40 quarters in the US, you’re entitled to SS.
This is a glaring gap. I’m not sure if they can close it down because there is, I think, a legal protection to the payment. But, boy if there isn’t, that should be the first thing they cut. Foreigners, who can’t vote getting SS income streams should be the first to go. I suspect the payments to Ukrainians are the same thing as what I’m receiving.
Morally, I’m entitled to the money, because I paid into the fund, but wifey never worked a single day and she’s getting 75% of my monthly. I should be getting it, not her. 🙂
This basically helps fund the monthly maintenance vig on the apartment. I also receive a monthly pension payment from my former employer. The IRS automatically lops off 35% off the payment because I’m a foreigner.
The amusing thing is back in 2020, wifey and I received some bullshit special COVID payment of about 3k when the government was trying to keep things afloat. I sent the money back as I felt awful keeping it. SS sent it back to me, so I kept it.
The rule is that if you’ve worked eggsactly 40 quarters in the US, you’re entitled to SS.
So what exactly is the principle here, you get it because you earned it (by working and paying in), or you get it because you exist despite not paying in (migrants, people who didnt work etc)?
Duk, as I explained, you only receive SS (includes spouse) if you’ve paid in. I have no idea why the fck you’d introduce the stuff about migrants or people who didn’t work.
The work part of what I mentioned refers to working 40 quarters and paying into SS for that period. The amount deducted is similar to the medicare levy we have in the way it’s taken out of your pay.
When it comes to Ukraine, Europe is delusional
Of course they did.
Democrats Encouraged Zelensky to Scoff at a Possible Peace Deal, Setting Up Oval Office Blowout
Bingo!
But it’s not just indigenes.
We now have a permanent (i.e. inter-generational) dysfunctional white underclass as well.
A welfare system that was intended to be a safety net has become a recliner chair.
Thanks to Gough Whitlam.
What we need to fix this is more socialism, comrade!
And Fraser did his bit. All down hill since then.
We simply won’t be able to afford it when the South Pacific Peso hits 40c.
Tucker Carlson Issues Withering Response to Zelensky’s Oval Office Meeting — Warns Ukraine’s ‘Serious Crimes’ Will Soon Come to Light
Gov. Healey Doesn’t Understand Why Companies Are Dismantling DEI Because CEOs Told Her DEI Is GREAT
They are still after American “guarantees”, which they’d be mad to provide.
UK, European leaders join forces to draft Ukraine peace plan to take to US
@wendyp4545
Zelensky sold the mineral rights to the UK and he played Trump to try to get more money out of the US but Trump found out according to Tony Shaffer.
Interesting. If true, and given the UK’s track record with security guarantees (Belgium 1914 & Poland 1939) ,if I were in the Ukraine I would get out now, all hell will break loose for the next few years
This was my point here a few days ago.
The US funds about 25% of WHO (not a massive budget admittedly) and about 1/3 of the UN.
When you take that cumulatively with the gas being turned up on the Euros to pay their way with NATO and a crimp being put in the USAID hose, the amount of free cash to splash is dwindling.
Andrew Lawrence
Centrist Dad- Keep the war going!
The UK deal is contingent on substantial US support.
Thats exactly what Keir said.
It’s like shit canning your neighbour.
Then saying you’re doing an extension on your
house, but only if your neighbour pays for it.
What planet are they on?
There’s not going to be US support.
It’s like Europe is in an alternate reality.
Until the bombs start dropping.
NATO Boss WARNS Zelenskyy
He complains about ‘innocent Ukrainian lives being lost’.
Where was the West when ‘innocent Russian lives were being lost’?.
Just FOAD, you barking mad grifting commie imbecile and get some “gerbil broiling” up ya while you’re at it.
Yep
let China step up. They do China’s bidding anyhow.
I genuflect toward the Altar of the Rabz Doctrine.
Long may it receive the Blessings of God!
Thanks Morsie, an absolutely hilarious update.
Bolton up on his haunches regurgitated in the Oz too!
Magnificently unhinged. I’m disappointed I didn’t think of it.
What?
Kidnap the First Hottie?
Are the mad?
Perhaps we should ask US taxpayers what they think of that deal?
I think someone did on 5 November.
Someone seems not to have gotten the message.
If funding is to be restored, it should be done on the proviso that UN workers are not tax exempt.
Tax the UN staff to make up the difference.
Watch the flood of resignations.
From Feldman’s Zelensky piece in American Thinker…
I can see the Trump/eagle already, arrows in one claw and a withered olive branch in the other.
Talking of welfare and the ndis in particular. My future DIL has a stupid brother who is drug addled and got out of the nick 18 months ago. He is on a huge ndis package because of his disability.
so it appears that every layabout and criminal a hole is being bunged on the ndis. It’s like train. Careering down the track with no brakes. The states have dismantled all support systems. We are heading for a fiscal cliff.
Gillard!
Time bombs – NDIS, Fair Work and Govt controlled volunteering.
I doubt that Dutton will touch either. We will need a financial collapse before the Moderates are booted and responsible budgetting returns.
The cost to the taxpayer of substance abuse is phenomenal, not to mention the cost to the abuser – a life forgone – and their loved ones.
It’s horrendous in the US with Fentanyl, which is why Trump is so fierce on this issue.
Fentanyl is worse than heroin because its dosage level is so dangerous; a first time user can suddenly keel over, as so many have done. There is no ‘experimentation’ period with this stuff.
The deaths are hitting so many middle-class American families now, as the culture says a bit of experimentation is ok.
It isn’t. Suddenly the unsuspecting family is at the funeral parlour.
I have a certain respect for the novelist who put arsenic contaminated heroin/narcotics in their story line.
My youngest brother was a heroin addict. The damage he caused himself, our parents, his own children, was horrendous.
I would have been relieved had he died in the depths of his addiction, had he not come to my home while my husband was away on business and I was at home with our two young children. He tried to stand over me for drug money in front of those kids.
Consequently, as his elder and fitter sister, I physically threw him out on the street in front of those kids, and told them bluntly that Uncle Chris was a drug addict and that’s what drugs do, and if you take them that will be you.
Lesson in life for all of them. He ended up with the Hare Krishnas and got clean, still a bit weird 30yrs later, but our kids don’t have a bar of sympathy for people who go that path.
Also, like us, endlessly resent our taxes supporting their loser lives.
On the other hand — is NDIS’ing the bloke cheaper than him being in gaol and/or thieving ?
.. of course that doesn’t count the scamming middle-merchants.
Its one way they fudge the unemployment numbers…. give them other labels
Tunnel vision.
‘Life and death’: Bob Katter’s key demand as federal election looms (Sky News, 3 Mar)
Maybe Florence could dig it.
Remember when Trump said if you stop testing for COVID, it will go away? They are going to try the same con with the recession.
Ass Press, haha.
You’d prefer TASS?
Does mUntard know Martin, currently polluting CL’s blog.
They seem to use the same leftard talking points.
Once a Tard, always a Tard.
Are you talking about the per capita recession Australia has been in for the past two years?
More drones.
Diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace are under attack—here’s why they matter more than ever (Phys.org, 2 Mar)
Somehow I don’t think they’ll be voting for the Liberal Party after that spray. Here’s who they are:
Hey Elon! After you finish with the US deep state I think we need your help to clean out our universities…
RMIT school of hairdressing and typewriting skills “University”
Don’t diss typewriting skills.
They’ve done me proud.
Mrs Beertruk clocked at 120 words per minute and 99% accuracy on the electric typewriter in late 80s early 90s. She was working at Griffith Uni in Brisbane at the time.
Still have the certificate somewhere.
As a cadet journalist I had to do 80wpm typing and 120wpm shorthand to get a grading. Turns out, like music, both are excellent tools for the brain, enhancing mathematical and linguistic skills.
Overused expression. To paraphrase Will Munny: We all FAFO.
Fuk me, the leftoid/demorat response to the Trump zelensky stoush are mind numbing. The stupidity on display is at critical levels: the krauts, poms and frenchies are going gangbusters to WW111 but this probably sums up the rest of the morons:
Disney’s ‘Star Wars’ Star Mark Hamill Defends Zelensky, Calls Trump and Vance ‘Putin Puppets, a Disgrace to Our Country’
Look at that face. Rub and tug comes in a close second with his slap in the kisser to Trump with his we support ukraine bullshit. This will have all the effect of a fart on a bull elephant but will still provoke. Trump will have no illusions about Australia being full of commie eunuchs now. Christ, rub and tug is a disgusting pathetic cockroach.
On eunuchs:
Until we’re not.
It’s disheartening watching principle-free Australian politics in operation.
There most likely will be a slowdown veering towards a recession over the next 9 months or so as a result of the adjustment (front-loading imports) before the tariffs begin to hit. That’s no biggie, fatboy. Keep your eye on the ball.
I’m not going to sugar coat his tariff policy as I think its destructive. If Trump really wanted to lower the trade deficit, he’d try to balance the budget as that would do it.
However, with Trump, you’re buying the whole package – good and bad. The energy policy will be great and deregulation will be too.
It’s the whole package with him. Now go scoff down a dozen donuts.
The whole package:
Can anyone tell me a single thing Trump has done so far to make life better for working class people, without invoking culture wars bulldust or lying their arse off?
Okay, then with this swill everyone has to conclude, you’re either totally stupid or just trolling.
Both?
Plus he has no dick.
He’s making it easier to be a producer and harder to be a non-producer.
Ergo, his policies are increasing production.
You’re welcome.
In his first term, rust belt jobs, jobs, jobs, jobs for working class blacks, whites, and brindles.
I look forward to the climate doomers telling us how Alfred hitting Brisbane is unprecedented*, and due to climate change.
* well, except for all the others all the way back to 1893 which we’ll ignore.
On last nights news, the graphic offered looked like Alfred was going to have to make a sudden 45 degree turn to hit Brisbane, or would just keep bumping along the coast.
And look at this crap:
‘A Variety of Tactics Designed to Induce Conversion’: The Persecution of Christians, January 2025 :: Gatestone Institute
The article deals with the incidence of forced child marriages (spit) in islam with young girls of 10 or less years being abducted, raped and forcibly married. Yet, can you see one so called leftoid feminist up in arms about this.
And yet the very same people who commit these horrific crimes are able to portray themselves as the ‘victims of racism’ when the real victims strike back.
Sickening – I can no longer read these things, since 7/10 I am full to the top with gut wrenching horror and sadness.
I’m not certain of that yet. If they can get the Europeans to do more they might continue their support.
Sounds like a frozen conflict scenario with NATO forces in UKR, followed by rearming of UKR. RUS will just continue pressing forward until they come to their senses.
Roy Spencer put this up:
For three years, Volodymyr Zelensky has been America’s darling, a khaki clad symbol of defiance, pleading for billions in aid and NATO’s embrace amid Ukraine’s self inflicted war.
To many well-meaning Americans, he’s a hero battling overwhelming odds. But behind the curated image lies a far uglier truth, a stooge comedian turned president, propped up by a criminal oligarch, surrounded by cronies, and presiding over a regime of corruption, repression, and broken promises.
This is the real Zelensky, an actor playing a role he’s woefully unfit for, that was proven yesterday in the oval office.
As Ukraine spirals deeper into chaos and its brutally harvested conscript army collapses in retreat, it’s important that decent Americans understand who and what this man really represents.
Let’s start with Kvartal 95, The Oligarch’s Launchpad, Zelensky’s story starts not in politics but comedy. Born in 1978 in Kryvyi Rih, he co-founded Studio Kvartal 95 in the 1990s with a group of friends that had hit it big by the 2000s, ironically their big breaks were made in Russia, performing in Russian and focusing on Russian and Ukrainian political and cultural life. The key to all this success? Ihor Kolomoisky, a billionaire ukrainian oligarch with a laundry list of crimes, including fraud, money laundering, and brutal violence. Kolomoisky then owned 1+1, the TV network that handed Zelenskys Kvartal 95 a national platform starting in 2012. He didn’t just offer airtime. He bankrolled Zelensky with cash, security, and legal and criminal muscle. This wasn’t mentorship. It was a transaction. Kolomoisky, later sanctioned by the U.S. for “significant corruption,” saw Zelensky as a pawn in his game. By 2019, when Zelensky ran for president, Kolomoisky’s DNA was all over the campaign providing vehicles, lawyers, bodyguards, and a media blitz. Zelensky was never an outsider; he was a “made man”
This is where it gets almost unbelievably bizzare. In 2015, Zelensky starred in “Servant of the People,” a hit satire aired on Kolomoisky’s 1+1 channel, where he played a teacher turned president railing against corruption.
Ukrainians, tired of the endemic corruption in the post Soviet state, lapped it up. Then, in 2018, his Kvartal 95 crew decided to turn fiction into reality, registering a political party called, you guessed it, “Servant of the People.” It had absolutely no manifesto, no policies, and no plan of action, just a TV title and Zelensky’s face.
Running in 2019, Zelensky promised to end corruption and the Donbas civil war, which had erupted after the CIA backed Maidan Coup, winning in a landslide thanks to Kolomoisky’s media machine. An actor who played a president on TV was now remarkably in the real job.
Zelensky didn’t waste any time handing power to his showbiz pals. Ivan Bakanov, a Kvartal 95 co-founder, became head of the SBU security service with no experience. Serhiy Shefir, another comedy crony, took a top aide role, no experience. And then there’s Andriy Yermak, a film producer turned Zelensky’s right-hand man, now head of the Presidential Office, dubbed Ukraine’s “shadow president.” Yermak, physically and intellectualy towering over Zelensky, controls policy and access, a fixer running the show while the president flounders. These weren’t appointments based on merit. They were loyalty hires, a Kvartal 95 clique utterly unfit for a grossly dysfunctional war-torn nation.
Zelensky’s laughable anti-corruption pledge met reality in 2021 with the Pandora Papers. The leak revealed he and his inner circle,including Bakanov, were funnelling cash to Kolomoisky with Zelensky stashing millions offshore.
Zelensky swore to end corruption and the Donbas war. Instead, he’s delivered more of both, a million lie Dead, the free Media crushed, billions stolen, languages and religion banned. This criminal is no hero. No Churchill. And no friend of America. He should be treated accordingly.
(14) Facebook?
Yeah. Tough one. Although he did go toe-to-toe with the Russians, especially around Kyiv, and hasn’t nicked off into the nether with his millions. Context plays a role. If I was running for Lingiari and believed I could do it without closed door deals with the four land councils, well, yeah, I wouldn’t win. Ukranian society isn’t for the faint hearted.
Thanks for the update and correction, Dover. Until now, I didn’t know that it was Ukraine that attacked Russia.
I didn’t write the above.
If you post something without a qualifier, the assumption should be that you agree, especially when it comes to Russia.
One other point, it’s laughable to be constantly calling out z man being corrupt when Pukin has a net worth upward of US$200 billion earning a salary of around 150K a year.
Neither did I post it. You might what to double check before mouthing off.
Oh okay, Apologies as I assumed it was you.
Let me ask you, do you agree with it?
I’m not going to bother reading it.
Sure, but you agree or disagree with the excerpt I posted?
I see we’re in full retard wussia, wussia wussia mode today.
Why does that old Hammil turd keep popping up?
Cos’ the lid on the box keeps popping open.
Relevance Deprivation Syndrome.
Hammil is North American slang for, ‘floater.’ It’s like in Australia we refer to a blocked dunny as being due, ‘the goddamn Mungo that’s stuck in the bend.’
Let’s see if anyone can beat this: 3rd nations chap at mardi grai:
Facebook
He obviously doesn’t know that, in traditional Aboriginal society, gay men had their legs smashed, and were left behind to die when the tribe “moved on.”
Love the red stilettos. To explain them Bruce Pascoe could include a first nations’ fashion chapter in his next book.
I always knew those red nappies were gay.
Wow. Lot to unpack there.
Yes well, red is a strong colour amongst aboriginal men. One of our men used to wear red underpants (not on his head) when he was going to see ladies at the next station – his courting undies – even though he had a good wife back home.
He also used to put bits of salt beef fat in his hat band and placed his saddle on a dead horse to further enhance his strength. Strong smell is a sign of manly strength. Red is also good for curing headaches and general sickness.
I’m not sure he could run far in those heels, though, tracking his wounded prey although his weapon of display is a two pronged fishing spear so maybe not much running involved. Maybe more mincing than running.
However, what gives his faux aboriginality and possible cultural appropriation is this – I really dont believe he can be thoroughly authentic with out wearing a possum skin cloak and he doesn’t seem to want to mess his hair up by placing the ochre paint there. He is also wearing a thong or something totally European.
We cant see if his big toe has been broken or a front tooth knocked out or if he is whistle cocked, he has no tribal scars across his chest, so we cannot be sure he actually is a tribal man, so together with the absence of cloak and smoke and gum leaves and no demonstrated prowess with the spear I’m afraid I will have to say – BS Mincing Artist.
Stilettoed fauxborigine…
SFL’s are on full display. I despair.
Dutton ‘disappointed’ by Trump’s treatment of Zelensky
Peter Dutton says he was “disappointed” by the way Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was treated by US President Donald Trump and Vice-President JD Vanceover the weekend, marking the strongest Coalition rebuke of the extraordinary confrontation in the White House.
The Opposition Leader said it was “important” that European leaders were arranging a “coalition of the willing” to support Ukraine. However, he said Australia should not send troops to support that grouping were that to eventuate.
“There’s no need for Australia to send troops but we should continue our support for Ukraine,” he said.
“President Zelensky is a modern day hero, he’s a war hero and he deserves support and I thank very much Prime Minister Starmer for his support and for his leadership in Europe.”
Mr Dutton was asked whether he thought the confrontation at the White House over the weekend was an example of the US “standing behind Zelensky and Ukrainians”.
“No, I was disappointed by the scenes out of the White House and I believe that President Zelensky requires the support of European countrie,s of the United States and countries like Australia as well,” Mr Dutton said.
“Australia is a well respected international player, we have Defence Force, the envy of the world, we do need to provide more support to the men and women of the Australian Defence Force but we need to recognise also that European nations need to invest more heavily in their own defences and the defences right across Europe.
“People have got short memories and it’s not that long ago since the Second World War and when the Prime Minister says that we live in the most precarious period since the Second World War, he’s right and what we know is that bullies don’t respect weakness and we are going to stand up with like-minded countries in support of peace in Europe and make sure that Russia can feel the pressure of having to settle a deal quickly so that Ukraine and her people can get on with a normal life as quickly as possible.”
“The world needs to unite behind President Zelensky to stand up against a murderous dictator in Vladimir Putin and Vladimir Putin has no regard for human life, he’s demonstrated that with his own people, let alone what he’s done against the Ukrainian people.
“So we stand very strongly behind and with President Zelensky and we’ve done that proudly from day one and there will be no deviation from that whatsoever.”
Oh Lord. Vomit making
the optics weren’t good to begin with and when this is the response.
Wouldn’t matter now if the libs won every seat in Oz, Dutton is a peanut.
And this man could well be our next PM.
So Mr Dutton, if you had a dollar to spend on defence – would you spend it on defence against Russia or China? Who poses the greatest threat to Australia?
We desperately need a Trump.
The phrase Mr Potato is looking for is, “If I am PM there is no way we will go within coo-ee of that shitshow”.
I’m not going to say I told you so.
Dutton will also keep migration at ponzi levels and say we can’t afford tax cuts. In fact, he has already said as much.
Still, he’s not Albanese.
And he is bald; that’s got to be worth something.
Agreed. NSW & Vic party are beholden to the Indian vote now.
Well that inspired me to write to my Feral member. Stand by.
Our defense force ‘is the envy of the world’.
There’s your first problem, there.
We need the US for our defense like never before.
Dutton, you are a frigging moron.
You’ve just lost the next election – most of your supporters will go to the marginal parties and the election will go to a minority Labor government with all its Marxist policies.
Just like what happened to GB.
Bouncing balls.
Hezbollah’s Nasrallah ‘wept’ over Mossad beeper operation, son says (JPost, 2 Mar)
Well yes, the footage certainly made my eyes water. Ouch! Still what’s not to like about getting a free transgender operation?
Dr Mutton: “Zelensky is a modern day hero, he’s a war hero”
War criminal, more like.
Jisus. WhoTF is advising him? Wong’s DFAT.
Tulsi spilling the tea on Zelenskyy
https://x.com/elonmusk/status/1896248819547070782#m
Basically reinforcing the dictator label.
I don’t think any of this is new but it’s good to hear it from everyone’s favourite DNI.
Behind the Speccie paywall so I can’t copy and paste. However, they appear to be somewhat more nuanced than the opinions of … just about everyone in Australian politics and legacy media.
A diplomatic dust-up for the ages
Trump is a peacemaker, not a bully
The TV clown a war hero? Never seen active service afik. Unlike Vance.
Indolent pasted:
When exactly is this Schaffer character suggesting that Trump found out?
Because about 21 minutes into the T-Z press conference Trump was saying the USA would have workers there to get the rare earths and so the minerals-for-arms deal was apparently still on at that point.
Zelensky said in London yesterday the US deal was still on.
Make of that what you will.
Maybe the UK/EU offers to defend any truce are enough for him now.
He’s not going to tip his hand about what he knows about any mineral deals Zelensky has done. He’s going to talk like it’s a live option even if he knows Zelensky has already done other side deals. In fact, if that is the case, he will keep letting the line run out.
Zelensky may have sold some mineral rights to the Brits.
But I suspect Trump is onto something else. Could it be something closer to home?
Could it be that some of the proceeds of Uke Minerals are making their way via a circuitous route to the US?
To the “Big Guy” and associates?
And Trump wants to force Zelensky to welsh on those under the table deals and then watch the fallout?
I look forward to the climate doomers telling us how Alfred hitting Brisbane is unprecedented*, and due to climate change.
Already spooling up among news.com kiddies. BOM is overclassifying as usual in track map. JTWC prognostic reasoning this morning had this gulping in dry air, moving into seas too cold to sustain a cyclone and increasing vertical windshear all further weakening it. Yesterday the association moisture was completely dislocated from the centre of circulation. No talk about transition to what’s known as an extratropical low yet but they would have to be considering it.
It was a bare Cat 2 when it went over Cato Is a day and half ago and what was left of a sort of eye went close to the island. Winds dropped from 80km/h to 5 km/h with associating pressure drop then picked up on the other side.
My feeling is the coastal areas and Islands will get hammered by gales but a couple km inland it will be a nothing burger. Way it looks in the vapour loop is there may be not much rain with it by the time it reaches land.
Fwiw I looked at Windy.com’s prognosis earlier, it had the beastie nearly evaporating by the time it crossed the coast on Friday.
On the other hand that was right over Brisbane, so batten your hatches Brisbanites as you’re going to get a drenching.
Brand new Euro AI model (supposedly the best for cyclone track forecasts) has it dying as it gets near the coast, and never actually crossing, just wander up to cross as a trough in northern Wide Bay.
All the rest have it crossing the coast, mostly Sunshine Coast as a cat 1 after weakening in approach.
basically, if Alfred arrives Thursday it will be nasty with high winds and rain, Friday or later and mostly rain impacts.
As an aside, tropical cyclone Linda in March 2018 (cat 2 at peak) has a very similar track to Alfred to date, but did not have an upper trough to reintensify it as a hybrid TC and then a ridge under it to drive it west. So it died out about where Alfred should be in the morning.
Looks likely to be this.
However, a big problem for the Brisbane metro area will be any storm surge that accompanies the low. A high tide up to Hamilton reach, fighting against heavy rain coming down river will produce serious flooding.
BOM tells us that Cyclone Alfred is going to make landfall at Brisbane on Wednesday night.
Apparently the local Colesworth is presently being emptied of ‘essentials’.
I’ve reassured Mrs Faustus that the ‘stuck at the side of the track’ emergency bag in the work ute has a 5 days supply of camp pie and baked beans for two.
Oddly, she doesn’t seem too impressed.
Mrs entropy just came back with an absolutely shit am radio and a bag full of baked beans tins. We won’t need a cyclone to blow the roof off.
That’s because you forgot the tomato sauce, silly.
A trap for young players.
Just watched a bit of the Oscars and even the entertainment numbers are sort of rubbish, boring. There is more drama, musical skills and entertainment value on Australian Idol with a bunch of unknowns.
All you need to know is the two front runner fillums feature respectively a tranny gangster and gay rape.
They, along with Mary Sue films just about sum up modern films.
Adrien Brody just asked for no more anti-semitism in his Oscar acceptance speech. Well, that will be that for him now, he did not even ask to stop Islamophobia or that he stands with Palestinians or with Zelensky and Ukraine.
Some other Oscar winner is pleading with audiences to go to cinemas and watch films or that part of the culture will disappear. How about making movies that people want to watch. Don’t feed us your degenerate crap.
Australia is a prison state. Fines for people living on boats
During a cost of living crisis Maritime are cracking down on people living on boats. This video discusses the situation on the Clarence River in NSW. I was working in Iluka and was forced to quit my job and move up river. Now l am being forced to leave the river, despite not having my boat ready for an ocean crossing, or face a $5500 fine and boat seizure.
I loved living on my boat for 18 months
What do you do with your umm, grey water?
On the Sydney-Ncl train it was mesmerizing to lift the lid on the loo and watch the sleepers passing by. That’s a hundred and fifty kilometres of no.s one and two.
Same with the Tasman Limited when I was a kid travelling to Hobart. Bog users when stopped at a station weren’t appreciated
In the olden times at uni we went on a rail tour in those old Pullman carriages attached to the back of any train going past. It was a great thrill for some lads to drop one in Rockhampton where the line runs up the street.
Same thing the fish do with theirs.
The fish love it.
Saw something today about rough sleepers in Melbourne about to be fined.
In QLD you can be fined for sleeping in your car.
OK…some people can be nuisances, but if someone is not bothering anyone this is just mean-spirited, esp. at a time when many have no choice.
No different to the NSW coppers putting breathos on guys sleeping in backs of utes after a B&S if they had keys in pocket.
Problem is it depends on the copper and some coppers are pr*%$s, especially the traffic variety.
It’s a function of too many bureaucrats who have to keep passing more and more restrictive laws to justify their jobs and salaries.
This is why we have to slash the positions.
If we don’t they will suffocate us.
Indolent pasted DavidSacks opinion:
I kept seeing this phrase “Zelensky’s meltdown” yesterday and every time my reaction was the same, “what meltdown?”
Everything was going fine until the last 8 minutes of the meeting. I cannot accept that any meltdown happened prior to that time because 8 minutes before the end is when Z asked JD the question that kicked off the argument.
So did Z meltdown after that point? I can find maybe two places but this is really open to interpretation.
In my first viewing neither of these stood out as significant compared to the raised voices and berating that JD and Trump were dishing out. In relative terms, Zelenskyy remained the calmest of the three. It just didn’t look like a meltdown.
There seem to be a lot of social media influencers trying to convince you of what happened in the meeting that just doesn’t match the actual video.
The “meltdown” was the fact that the moron was too stupid to see that he needed to build some bridges.
Think about this.
He has one major benefactor nation in the form of the US.
In a two horse Presidential race he decides to throw in his lot with Kamal-toe.
Why?
Because the Dimocrats assured him that, even if Trump won, the grift would continue.
OK.
He got sucked in back in October.
Given the Deep State frustrated Orange Hitler 1.0, he could be forgiven for thinking that would repeat for Orange Hitler 2.0 (although openly campaigning for Kamal-toe was not smart).
Fast forward to February.
It is clear that Trump is dismantling any back-door funding and wasn’t all-in with Project Eternal War.
What does Zed-boy do?
He doubles down by meeting with sidelined Dimocrats and takes their advice to get stuck into Trump.
Dumb. As. Dogshit.
The meltdown was when he decided he might talk over Trump for a good 30 seconds when it was apparent that Trump had cracked it with him.
You’re redefining “meltdown”. That’s cheating.
What do you define as a “meltdown”?
I mean, does it have to have an actual pram with dollies being tossed out of it?
The whole bullshit body language of eye-rolling, arm-folding and generally doing a passable impression of Greta Thunberg at a coal industry conference was just appallingly stupid.
His total inability to read the room was what I would call a “meltdown”.
He looked like a cornered rat who might have sold the same single piece of cheese to three other rats and they are about to turn up at the same time to collect.
A Moment in History:
US President Joe Biden has said he thinks his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin will “move in” on Ukraine but does not want “full-blown war”.
20 January 2022
Shit happens when you have to send a Press Secretary to mop up after a Dementia President who has apparently just had a moment of clarity.
WeatherWatchTV:
Cyclone Alfred: Monday update as Brisbane, SE Qld, NE NSW prepare for direct hit
It’s just like Albo, half hearted. Farting around the coast not really doing anything except spoiling peoples’ days. Just get on with it FFS.
Only one sprinkler on at the Longreach Airport.
Oh to be there and watch it in person.
“Ready for our next trick” ( :
Hans Zimmer LIVE – Docking Scene (No Time for Caution)
Great analysis of the Trump little bastard zelensky stoush by Liberal Hivemind who draws from Marco Rubio, Steve Millar and some fantastic black guy on fuking CNN for insights. Zelensky is a useful idiot and his backers are arseholes:
CNN suffers HUMILIATION as they’re informed they missed the whole backstory!!
LOL – The Clinton News Network, or, now the Clinton News Netwoke.
Personally, I agree with it – Zelinksyy had the opportunity to sign a peace deal with Putin, but Boris Johnston talked him out of it.
So in a way, those deaths and that destruction are on Zelinskyy.
Or perhaps Johnston for persuading him to walk away from the deal.
Or perhaps EU/NATO for making Putin believe they would cross his red line of no NATO for Ukraine
Or perhaps Biden for saying NATO would be arguing about what to do if Putin invaded.
Most likely, a combination of the above.
But Putin? No, not really. He warned about what would happen if they kept pushing him, and like schoolyard kids it was all fun and games until somebody got killed. Then it was “He started it!” and “We’re gonna punch your head in!”
To paraphrase Rubio “Grow the f*ck up!”.
And just to be clear, I think what Putin did in invading was wrong, but I understand why he did it – for him, it was “bad” or “worse” and he chose “bad”.
Just like Trump, I want the dying to stop. Zelinkskyy is apparently too interested in keeping power, grifting more cash from the US and EU, and screw everyone and everything else. He wants the US to get involved directly – which would have a high probability of degenerating into a nuclear WWIII. Stuff that – sorry Ukraine, you ain’t worth that risk.
Power such as that enjoyed by that jumped-up little ex comedian is very very hard to give up. And that’s not even adding the massive amount of money it has provided to him and wifey.
The story of Zelensky’s rise is so outrageous – yet few in the general community in the West have any idea.
Pretty tough way to “grift”, making yourself the number one assassination target of Putin.
Lemme ask you, how much would you require in cash to swap places with him?
What do you give as his expected lifespan from this point?
Arky, Zelensky entered that grey area when he first became involved in Viktor Yunukovych’s rearrangement of Ukraine’s landscape.
Even so, I am surprised that the little court jester cum Great leader, has lasted this long.
When you’re a puppet it’s someone else pulling the strings. Zelensky aint that bright.
If $200 billion in cash went in and he got 1%, that $2 billion. Even if he gave half of that $2 billion back to Biden and the Dimocrats (and you can bet their cut didn’t come out of is pocket anyway), he’s still got a cool $1 billion in some Swiss bank account or something.. He’ll run as soon as he thinks he has to, just watch. Not saying he’ll make it, but he’ll certainly try as soon as he feels has to – that there is no more left, or Putin or someone else is too close to killing him. I doubt he’ll be a runner in the next election in the Ukraine – unless he does it from outside the country!
This is something which was touched on in a Powerline piece linked earlier today (without being so explicit).
In Western politics, deposed leaders toddle off to be Ambassador to Bongo-Congo or Chairman of the Water and Sewerage Board or some other Quango.
In parts of the Middle East, Africa and Eastern Europe, losing the top job has far more dire consequences.
See, Gaddafi, M; Hussein, S and “Merry Christmas Mr and Mrs Ceacescu!”
Do you think a 2 bedroom flat in Moscow was Assad’s retirement plan?
I wouldn’t take that trading places with him.
Zelinsky is not going to last another month. Probably less than a fortnight.
He’s living in a country that has lost tens of thousands of men who have left behind widows and mothers.
One of them will pick up a rifle and vote him out.
Never underestimate a Slavic woman who feels threatened.
Yeah, I’m sure cops hear this all the time: the wife “made” him beat her up because she didn’t place the salt shaker on the table before he sat down for dinner. The delusion here is a pretty impressive stack of bullshit piled on more bullshit.
It was Russia that attacked Ukraine, and the reason is that Putin has a desire to resurrect the old Russian empire. It’s a pretty deep mental quagmire when the leader of the country defending itself against an attack and annexation attempt is blamed for the deaths of hundreds of thousands of young men. But there you go. That kind of twisted thinking has become normalized with some people here—especially when we had one notable “deep thinker” pushing the revisionist view that Churchill was worse than Hitler and that Churchill caused the war.
You are still locked into the “right vs wrong” argument.
Trump is trying to negotiate for peace between two warring nations who both consider themselves to be in the right.
I prefer the Trumpian approach – get both sides to accept a shitty deal with both good and bad outcomes for both sides, with the big plus of many…many deaths stopping.
We can’t walk and chew gum at the same time, right, OSC? We can discuss both the history of Russian mendacious behavior in the region and the goings-on regarding potential peace deals if they ever come to pass.
If you don’t like the subject you can always start one up as no one is your entertainment p.a.
What’s on your mind?
My email to Feral Member:
Dear Garth,
It seems we are about to have a Federal election called. While anything is better than the Green/Teal/ALP loose coalition the LNP/Liberal Party/Nationals seem to have policies only slightly better.
Support for free speech seems to be largely absent. This is required in a democracy so that really dumb ideas are called out and don’t get up.
I see Peter Dutton supports Julie Inman Goebbels. The woman is extremely dangerous and should have her Australian citizenship stripped and be deported back to the United States.
I just learned that Peter Dutton stands with Ukraine. This is about as brain dead an idea as I can think of. The place isn’t a democracy, is deeply and vastly corrupt and is fighting a lost cause getting hundreds of thousands of people killed.
The whole thing was totally unnecessary, driven by a bunch of neo cons in Washington led by Victoria Nuland (aka the War Pig) et al. I do not understand where the Russia hate comes from. Modern Russia is NOT the Soviet Union.
I lived through the Cold War and long understood the threat of imminent thermonuclear destruction. I visited San Diego in early 1985, on business and got a little paranoid after seeing the big grey boats in the harbour, knowing there were a bunch of communist ICBMs targeted there.
While I understand the idea of getting into military misadventures with the US as an insurance policy with our ally (as an alternative to arming up and looking after our own defence), Ukraine is not such a circumstance as the Americans have made it quite plain they have no time for the corrupt regime in Kiev (yes Kiev not Kyiv). I guess we’ve only wasted a cool billion or so. Might have been well used on the patched goat tracks that pass for highways around here. That billion buys 100km of good quality roads.
BTW you seem to have a Teal running against you. I’d ask where her backing is coming from. Depending on how many other “independents”run she might have a chance.
It is a pity Australia doesn’t have a Donald Trump, J.D.Vance or Javier Milei along with smart people like Elon Musk to advise them.
I hold no great hope for the future of this country.
Gee, Eyrie, we are on the same page. Yet, I am amazed at how many people who are usually critical thinkers have not done their homework on the contretemps in Ukraine.
Gee Eyrie, wish that I was able to express myself as well as you, can I pinch that to send to my useless politician?
Be my guest.
I’m wanting to do this also, Eyrie, that was brilliant!
In my family, all the smart people have emigrated to the USA.
Husband and I sat down today and watched the complete media show put on by Trump when confronting Zelensky. Well worth watching, as the selected pieces aired by the MSM don’t portray the nature of the confrontation.
A tribute to the Donald, again. Very orchestrated, controlled and revealing.
Still zero new information on the Epstein client list.
Let us hope it wasn’t a stunt to make people think they were being transparent while ensuring nothing new got out.
No new prosecutions, no new investigations announced, no inquiries started.
Just a stupid stunt.
Enemy action.
So That’s Why We Haven’t Seen the Real Epstein List (2 Mar)
Kash and Bondi have their work cut out getting the rats out of the place.
Be patient, I’m sure all will be revealed in due course, the money trail will be fascinating.
China & Japan fought a brief war in 1894-5? China lost & had to hand over Formosa (Taiwan?).
Huh.
I learned something new today.
China also lost the air war over the Straits from 1949 on. The Taiwanese Air Force put up an astounding kill ratio with their P-47s.
At some point Trump has to stop blowharding and get results.
”End the war on day one, it will be easy”.
”Drain the swamp”. We will know the swamp is drained when Epstein’s clients face justice.
”Bring the factories home” So far all you have done is driven Canada towards Europe and Europe towards China.
I get what you are trying to do Donald, but you risk perverse outcomes if you assume the rest of the world can’t do without you.
Yes, they needed the shock treatment.
But it’s a art, applying the appropriate shock without driving someone permanently away.
As completely hopeless as the Europeans are, at some point they might get their shit together, which is a desirable outcome, maybe even what you are driving for. But at the end of that process if they are more aligned with your enemies, of what point has it all been?
Trump is a wrecking ball, yes, much has to be wrecked, and we all enjoy cheering on the destruction of so much foolishness, but after the destruction there has to be people left who want to build something new and good.
Not a bunch of shell shocked refugees looking about going “What the hell did you do”?
It can’t be over emphasised how hopeless Europeans seem to be at the moment.
Their conferences and talk fests about what they are willing to do as long as it is backstopped by the US makes them look pathetic and contemptible.
One clown said “We risk being at war with Russia”.
I was gobsmacked. What the hell do you think has been going on these last three years while you trained Ukrainians and supplied them with munitions and arms?
Jesus wept, how clueless can you be?
For the first time I’m getting an inkling that Trump will lose the mid terms.
Which means another two years of impeachment crap and deadlock at a particularly important point of inflection.
That stupid set up in the Oval office makes MAGA thrilled. It really excites his supporters.
It seems like a great idea while your polling is at all times high.
But have a recession, poll numbers go down, the war drags on, at some point those scenes are going into Democratic ads in swing states and aren’t playing too well with some voters who voted Trump in 2024, even though it makes some of you feel great now.
These are my thoughts at the moment.
Some reservations developing.
Yes, they need the “I don’t care Margaret” attitude.
But ask Jeff Kennet what happens if you are oblivious to where the boundaries of the usefulness of that strategy are.
The boundary is where a confident dismissal of invalid arguments morphs into open contempt and grandstanding for a base.
That’s the danger.
And they all, on both sides, eventually overstep that line.
Nobody in the US will care about the war as long as they aren’t paying for it and the Eurotrash keep the violence down to less than nuclear war.
I understand where you are coming from. I wouid like to see a head on a platter, Its not an unreasonble request given the speed at which DOGE is working. Trump has a talk to congress soon so would be intresting to see what he says.
5 weeks on the job and has accomplished more than the Rats did in a whole term.
Yep the stock market has been ordinary and a sell off will really impact on Trump
Australia is a well respected international player, we have Defence Force, the envy of the world
LOL! He’s delusional. How’s it going keeping tabs on the PLAN Boats, Pete?
I bet they are pissing their pants in fear of us.
Yep, I read that and thought “in what bizarre parallel universe does this mutton headed moron exist”?
One of my oldest friends (?) has gone full Trump derangement. The latest talking point being that Putin is manipulating him into cutting Ukraine off.
The previous talking point was how Zelensky stuck it to Trump the narcissistic idiot.
*sigh*
All Australian media of all stripes except for a few people on Sky has for years fed TDS.Its little wonder that so many people suffer from it.
Newscorp outlets in Oz certainly have TDS. Even Bolta is suffering the disease. See his oped in the Tele today.
You got to wonder that they can’t seem to grasp why 77 million Americans voted for him, and that he presently has his highest ever approval rating.
TDS and Covid are a useful litmus test. Slip a little into conversation and stand back.
On simply does not mention sex, politics or religion when one is at drinks.
Alternatively, bring up Israel and then withdraw to watch the carnage from behind a potted plant.
Here we go: Chris Kenny can’t resist saying that Trump is too soft on, if not friendly with, Putin.
“Ukrainian Territory” was once part of Tsarist Russia.
The disgraceful humiliation of Zelensky – spiked
Poms lecturing the US again
That 3rd nations queer was really busy at mardi grai:
Just as well that wasn’t The Prophet.
Sky should punt Kenny to a late position and bring someone else forward.
Rita.
Ice cream maker update:
Finishing off the bacon maple syrup tub from yesterday.
Pretty darn good.
Really, we need to go down that road.
The French Rivera was once part of the Genoan Republic. Alsace has moved backwards and forwards between Germany and France. How about the new world and the indig then? There are countless examples of this patch of land was once governed by this or that state, so saying Ukrainian land was once part of Russia is pretty meaningless. In the early part of 90s a referendum carried 90% of the 86% per cent of the Ukrainian voters wanting to separate. That means something.
West Irian (west PNG) was never part of Indonesia. East Timor scored independence, but Indonesia took by force and held onto west PNG. International affairs aren’t always fair and reasonable.
Not even Gough Whitlam could stomach the idea of The People’s Republic of East Timor in 1975. Complete with Russian naval base in the Indonesian archipelago.
The people running East Timor are an ungrateful bunch of commies who should have been handed over to the Indons in 1999 for shooting.
This business about Ukraine once being part of Russia the Russian empire and therefore Russia has rights to all of it or large swags reminds me of Critical Race Theory and why past wrongs must be dealt with. It’s Russian/Pukin grievance central.
Yes, not a valid reason at all. Russian paranoia and Putin ambition is reason enough.
anyway, whatever justification for or against doesn’t matter anymore. The bugger is entrenched in Crimea and Donbas. He isn’t going anywhere unless he agrees, or the place goes to all out war with a massive injection of troops, with a pile of body bags going the other way. Most Americans, especially red staters, don’t want those body bags full of US soldiers.
so realistically, there will have to be an agreement with loss of Ukrainian territory of some extent. Zelensky, and most Ukrainians would not want that. The instant he agrees to that he is gonsky. So at least he wants some kind of forceful guarantee so Putin can’t reneg in whatever the deal is.
and of course,
Trump, elected to get US soldiers out of these kinds of things, isn’t interested in a guarantee from the USA.
FMD: kenny and some strategic analysis moron, shoebridge, dribbling the leftoid view of the stoush between Trump/zelensky as just a resource grab by Trump which poor, little zelensky was right to reject.
The media are vacuum brained. Trump’s plan was a joint venture between the US and ukraine and was an IMPLIED threat to puttie, not a direct one which would give justification to puttie to continue the war. This is to be compared with the eurotrash’s plan of boots on the ground and NATO membership which would be a DIRECT threat to puttie and justify his continuing of the war.
Before the meeting between Trump and zelensky the little pissant had campaigned against Trump, met with a group of demorats and RINOs and intended to renege on the agreement. The little bastard had been spoilt by the corpse biden who zelensky rang regularly and screamed at and abused and demanded money which he was always given.
Kenny and his frog faced expert either knew none of this or lied about it.
The little bastard
You meant “little rat bastard” I think
I’m actually a little sympathetic to the Ukrainians. They were led up the primrose path by the US. Used as a proxy to weaken Russia and now, when its become obvious to the US that a proxy war won’t be sufficient, they’ve decided to pull up stumps, leaving the Ukrainians in shit up to their waists, while also trying to cut a deal that repays the US for their “support”.
I also have sympathy for Ukrainians but for a different reason. Biden gave Putin the go-ahead for “a minor incursion” which naturally turned into a major one. Peace talks should have been launched as soon as Ukrainians made some headway. It’s unclear who refused the peace talks, Biden’s people or Zelensky.
” it may be dangerous to be America’s enemy but to be America’s friend is fatal” Kissinger, who knew a thing or two about Realpolitik,
Yeah, Ukrainians are retards and had no agency to figure things for themselves. I’ve seen some pathetic arguments before, but this takes the pavlova.
Some of them certainly were retards for buying what the US had to sell. The others that knew where this would lead just had to cop it because there was nothing they could do. But as for this being a pathetic argument, it literally presaged in 2015 what is happening now, but this was also prefigured by Burns half a decade before that, and by others, incl. Keenan decades earlier before that too.
Famous Fords continued.
The Bullitt Fastback Mustang as driven by Steve McQueen:
1968 Ford Mustang GT fastback. FE 390 cubic inch V8.
A most significant cultural moment – and a couple of icons right there.
Thanks, Arky.
Remember watching the axle tramp from that thing when he floored it!
Saw one a few years back in Bendigo in a shed same colour. GT 2+2.
Nothing sintilating to ad just that I saw one.
I hope to buy my own mustang late next year or 2027 (preferably in fact). But as I want a GT raptor AWD version to do a mad max impression across the vast wastes of this wide brown land, I suspect I will have to order sight unseen the day they are announced to have a chance.
Ukrainians voted to be separate from THE SOVIET UNION which had just collapsed.
Run a fair referendum today in the eastern and southern parts, then put the losers with their mates in the north and west. The rest is Russian.
Modern Russia is not the Soviet Union.
You could be right.
Ukrainians might vote to join Russia after being bombed and murdered by Russians for three years straight.
Certainly the Ukrainians who took out Russian citizenship because they were nominally Russian living in The Ukraine and had put up with months of Ukrainian artillery fire, would leap at the chance to have Russia looking after them.
How the fck would you know, you dipshit limy dickhead. As well as an aviator, you’re a mind reader now. Go back in the back yard and fly the remote.
The chimp just shat on the floor and is flinging its poo.
Listen to the un-showered worthless limy piece of shit. He’s a mind reader now as well as an astronaut. All from the hinterlands Queensland.
Ouch.
https://x.com/clairlemon/status/1896306975321002476?t=Z8VUyitAX4oiM9R1SnKcig&s=19
People who support Trump are stupid/or experiencing cognitive decline?
This is the flip side of “Lefties are all mentally ill.”
It’s not profound analysis; it’s childish.
She got ouched by Elon.
Another severe case of TDS.
‘Ouched’ has some esoteric meaning in this context?
Yes. She was added to the @Ifindretards account list after Elon was helpful.
I read “ touched” at first, and it all made sense for a moment.
Leaves a sour taste.
Ditto for Crimea.
@VigilantFox
MIND-BLOWING: Just 7,000 politically connected NGOs are hoarding 90% of all taxpayer money meant for nonprofits.
Roughly $300 billion in government money flows to nonprofits every year—with zero transparency on where that money actually goes.
Elon Musk recently told Joe Rogan that NGOs (Non-Governmental Organizations) are among the biggest scams ever.
That’s because taxpayer-funded NGOs act as a loophole to funnel billions into shadowy, unaccountable organizations—doing things that would be illegal if carried out directly by the government itself.
@DataRepublican (who’s featured in this clip) previously reported that the “Uniparty” is actually a network of NGOs partially funded by your tax dollars.
And the one thing they all have in common is that they claim to promote “democracy.”
According to her investigation, seven NGOs—heavily backed by USAID and the U.S. State Department—serve as the Uniparty’s enforcement arm, pushing propaganda under the guise of “protecting democracy.”
These groups, originally formed during the Cold War, have shifted their mission from spreading democracy abroad to protecting their own power—redefining “democracy” to mean preserving themselves.
Or, as Musk puts it, a threat to “democracy” really means a threat to the bureaucracy.
100%
@StephenM
Actually, if you were a foreign adversary of the US you’d support:
—Open borders and mass migration
—Teaching self-hatred to America’s children
—Destruction of faith and family
—Dragging America into forever wars
—Demonizing law-abiding citizens while empowering criminals and cartels
—Suffocating national development with unceasing and impenetrable regulation
—Financing marxist NGOs with unlimited taxpayer dollars
—Appointing radical judges to thwart the democratic will
—Deindustrialization of US manufacturing base
—Ending merit hiring across the public and private sector
—Erasing truth and waging war on nature and biology
—Promoting art, architecture and literature designed to denigrate and demoralize the country
—Forcing the shutdown of domestic energy infrastructure and production
—Debasing the currency through fraud, waste and government corruption
—Funding a permanent unelected bureaucracy that believes itself unanswerable to the people
Ben Harvey: How lefty luvvies and right-wing hardliners are both failing the Martu people of Newman
Ben HarveyThe West Australian
Sun, 2 March 2025 2:00AM
When BHP started developing the Mt Whaleback iron ore mine in the mid-1960s, most Aboriginal people in what is now called the East Pilbara had never seen a white person.
What a sight it would have been for them — enormous machines digging deep into the earth with what must have sounded like underground thunderstorms throwing giant rocks into the air.
Of all the astonishing new things the Martu saw at the freshly founded town of Newman, one of the least impressive — a small metal cylinder with red and white paint on it — would prove the most interesting.
In a few swift decades, cans of Emu Export destroyed a culture that for hundreds of generations had survived bushfires, cyclones and everything else the outback threw at it.
Booze wrenched apart the social order that allowed the Martu to thrive for tens of thousands of years in one of the most hostile places on earth.
And that is why Newman is today blighted by pockets of poverty and violence even though the town has generated more wealth than just about any other place on earth, courtesy of its status as ground zero of the Australian iron ore industry.
I wrote a story last week about this issue after I visited the town to investigate some of the social problems it was experiencing.
The above photo of Martu elder Peter Tinker in his filthy, shambolic house, triggered a lot of feedback from readers.
Peter lives in a part of Newman the locals call East Timor, because it looks like a poverty-stricken war zone.
Peter’s house was trashed by his own family, whom he is culturally obliged to take in when they need shelter.
The home is rude proof that Emu Export, as well as the sniffing of solvents and petrol, has all but snuffed out the intuitive respect for elders that was fundamental to the Martu’s survival for so long.
Readers who responded to the story fell into two camps: the lefty idealists who think you can hug away social disadvantage and the right-wingers who think a sharp dose of personal responsibility is needed.
To the lefties who reckon the answer is more money and more social welfare intervention.Please understand that you cannot drive down a street in Newman without seeing a community support vehicle.
The tens of millions of dollars that BHP has thrown at the problem over the past few years has been a rotten investment.
The light-touch, wrap-around support mechanisms so beloved by do-gooders has done little but condemn Aboriginal people in the town to the intergenerational kryptonite that is fetal alcohol syndrome.
We’re so paralysed by white guilt over the stolen generations that we now leave Aboriginal kids in places that are patently unsafe.
Do-gooders who rail against direct intervention through alcohol restrictions should be forced to look into the eyes of the black six-year-olds forced to stay in houses from which white kids would have been evacuated years ago.
A lot of those six-year-olds won’t be able to hold their focus should you stare at them, mind, because their eyes will likely be glazed over from the solvents they have been inhaling.
City folk stopping in Newman on the way back from Broome or Karijini might wonder why the empty water bottles that litter the streets have coloured bases.
They won’t understand that the colour is from the paint the kids spray into the bottle for a cheap high.
Those same people, many of whom might tut-tut about heavy-handed governments, probably won’t stop to think why deodorants and hair sprays are kept behind the counter at the local supermarkets.
The left has failed the Martu.
Unfortunately, so has the right.
To the right-wingers who think Aboriginal people should pull themselves up by their own bootstraps.You are right that the cult of personal responsibility is dead.
Trash your house? Yes, you’ll eventually get a new one.
Spend all your money on booze? Yes, someone will give you some vouchers for food.
But what’s the alternative?
Have the family live on your street? Because that’s exactly what will happen if they don’t get given another house.
Let the kids starve because the money was spent at Liquorland? They won’t because they’ll steal the food from your fridge.
Yes, parents should take more responsibility.
But let’s be realistic about the real-world impact of having FASD pass down from generation to generation since that first can of Emu Export was seen in 1966.
It means the parent from whom we are demanding responsibility may have the mental age of a 12-year-old. How would your kid in Year 7 go looking after your child who is in Year 2?
To any reader who thinks the children need a dose of discipline, consider the following.
New teachers at Newman’s three schools admonish Aboriginal kids who fall asleep in class; experienced teachers let them rest.
Experienced teachers know there’s a good chance that child is exhausted because of the previous night’s partying at the family home.
Experienced teachers know that child may have been up all night in case an uncle with beer breath and wandering hands stumbled into the bedroom.
So, the teachers who have been around let them sleep in class. For some kids school is less a place for learning and more a place for safety.
There is no silver bullet to this problem; the only thing we can do is chip away at the sides.
It’s a hard job for those at the coalface and the noise from the extreme left and right isn’t making their task any easier.
since that first can of Emu Export was seen in 1966.
Which was when Aborigines in Western Australia were demanding to be allowed to purchase and consume alcohol as one of their rights.
Very well said. Is there a WA Minister for Aboriginal Affairs? Where is the Federal one? BHP should know better IMHO.
WA Minister for Aboriginal Affairs is one Tony Buti – one time lawyer for the Aboriginal Legal Service, last seen ducking for cover over the matter of the Wagyl.
Not seen a white fella by the 1960s? Yeah bullshit.
All those cattle stations sure did employ aborigines. In fact just north of there was the place Whitlam announced the land rights act not even a decade later.
keep the support for this generation but remove it from remote communities to towns. It might help the next generation.
In a few swift decades, cans of Emu Export destroyed a culture
“And then the knife went in”, right?
As I like to remind the bleeding heart doogooders, the blessings of Western Christian prosperity must be tempered by Western Christian morality, or else you just get Sodom and Gomorrah.
So that’s Claire Lehmann struck off my “to do” list.
Zoe Saldana too.
Sad day.
@ggreenwald
The unpopular Sir Keir Starmer says he will assemble a “coalition of the willing” in Ukraine: the phrase his Labour Party and Bush used to invade Iraq.
He also boasts the UK will puts “boots on the ground” in Ukraine: but can only do so with “strong US backing.”
Sunday Talks: NSA Mike Waltz Says Zelenskyy is Going to Need to Make Territorial Concessions
@AutismCapital
NEW: TRUMP: “We should spend less time worrying about Putin, and more time worrying about migrant rape gangs, drug lords, murderers, and people from mental institutions entering our Country – So that we don’t end up like Europe!”
European leaders on edge as prospect looms of Trump pulling 20K troops from continent
Should pull all of them out. Screw the Eurotrash.
Yale Study Reveals Covid ‘Post-Vaccination Syndrome’ Victims.
SHOCK POLL: Frank Luntz Shares the (Albeit Unscientific) Results on Zelensky Freakout–Trump Will Love It
FMD, now credlin and uhlmann castigating Trump, implying he’s puttie’s puppet and praising the little rat bastard. Can any of these cretins see the genius of Trump’s plan. No other ‘plan’ has any credence.
@robinmonotti
“NO EXTENSION OF NATO’S JURISDICTION FOR FORCES OF NATO ONE INCH TO THE EAST of a unified Germany” – US Secretary of State Baker to Gorbachev, 1990.
Your taxes at work peasants! Be grateful and pay more!
$25,000 spend on bureaucrats’ ‘drama classes’ as just 13 attend
Services Australia staff were treated to lessons from the National Institute of Dramatic Art, under a nine-day $25,000 contract.
More than $25,000 was spent on giving just 13 government bureaucrats dramatic arts training to teach them how to “communicate with empathy”, with the Coalition lashing the cash-splash on the “farcical” contract for Services Australia boffins.
The government agency contracted the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA) to provide training for its high-level leaders, with just over a dozen staff participating in the sessions across two training days at a cost of $25,817.91.
Liberal Senator Claire Chandler declared it “farcical” that tens of thousands of dollars was being spent on training just 13 senior professionals on how to communicate.
“On the Albanese Government’s watch Services Australia spent hundreds of thousands of taxpayers’ money on speechwriters and drama classes, while Australians were left waiting months for their pensions to be approved,” she said.
“This is a typical example of the Albanese Government’s wasteful spending and bizarre priorities amidst a cost-of-living crisis.”
A Services Australia spokesman confirmed to The Telegraph just 13 staff attended two NIDA courses under the nine-day contract.
“NIDA corporate training is highly regarded and widely used across both government and non-government organisations for senior management development purposes,” he said.
“In October 2024, 13 staff attended two separate NIDA courses, at a total combined cost of $25,817.91.
“Services Australia is a large and complex organisation, with approximately 35,000 staff. This training helps our staff develop skills to tailor communication to meet the needs of our vast and diverse audience.”
Senior staff at Services Australia, which helms agencies like Centrelink and Medicare, defended the spend when grilled by Senator Chandler in Senate estimates.
One representative of Services Australia told estimates the training “is about having confidence in presenting, whether it’s presenting at estimates or in other forums, and training our leaders in how to … present with a level of confidence … in what they’re delivering”.
This was denied by a colleague shortly after, with Services Australia deputy CEO Susie Smith saying the training was instead to refine messaging to users of the department’s services.
“It was actually about how … can we best ensure that we tailor our messages, that we communicate with empathy, that we think about stories that relate to the cohorts that we serve in the community, and that we do so in a respectful and appropriate way,” Ms Smith said, denying the lessons were to help senior staff prepare for estimates.
The criticism from the Coalition comes amid Peter Dutton’s pledge to cut from the 36,000 bureaucrats hired under the Albanese Government in a bid to slash spending and fund election promises.
Senate estimates last week also uncovered a $57,000 spend on an office fit-out for a former Department of Parliamentary Services bureaucrat, with $20,000 of that spent on a bespoke desk that is currently in storage.
The Coalition has previously taken aim at government expenditure on Welcome to Countries, after documents unveiled under freedom of information laws revealed $550,000 has been spent on the ceremonies during the Albanese Government’s first term.
NIDA was contacted for comment.
Daily Tele
In previous government employment I was inflicted by some some carpet bagger doing “laughter medicine” as a team building/wellbeing exercise, no doubt so our clueless SES officer could fill in the KPI in her performance agreement.
anyway, gave it a go because nice person. But about a minute of this absolute bullshit, walking around in a circle doing forced laughter (just as good, we were assured), I said out loud “what an appalling waste of taxpayer money!” and stalked out. A few of the more rural types ( male) followed me.
It was never mentioned again. At least in my hearing.
Risk my employment, you ask? Well, firstly, public service before DEI and weaponised Code of Conduct took off, plus, what was she going to do? Go to the mattresses and have it come out she had paid for a “laughter medicine” carpet bagger?
Cripes. My husband’s advertising agency did this sort of thing with NIDA back in the 1990s. It was thought quite groundbreaking at the time to subject one’s staff to such drivel.
As a senior parter and the National Creative Director, the spouse was asked to nominate his most admirable leader of the ages, and he nominated Ulysses S. Grant “because he won the Civil War while he was pissed, that’s a real leader.”
The NIDA workshop leaders didn’t appreciate his creative leadership contribution.
@robinmonotti
War is a racket.
But where does this money actually go?
“To gain insight, Visual Capitalist’s Marcu Lu and Bhabna Banerjee ranked the world’s top 25 defense companies by 2022 revenues, using data from Defense News.
Note that their graphic shows each company’s revenues from defense, and not total revenues. This is because many companies such as Boeing also generate revenue from non-defense related industries and sectors.
I honestly don’t get you all now downright hatred of Zelensky.
To me it corresponds to the way the left fell in love with being locked down. Because they were told to love being locked down.
At the most he seems irrelevant to your own situation.
At the least he is a guy representing his country.
Only Russians would seem to have the real world motivation to feel this level of hate towards the man.
I think Orwell was right.
If I was reading original thoughts it would be more than the same handful of stupid points repeated over and over.
Some of these points are ridiculous on face like the one about wearing a suit.
Explain it to me please, in words of your own making, with respect to why you give a damn.
I think the anger is better directed at Biden for dribbling out the aid over such a long period of time, and at the Europeans for not rebuilding their armaments industries in response to the initial invasion, and for flirting with socialism, runaway immigration and a bloated welfare state.
And for not foreseeing the end of a global order as all the signs were happening around them.
It’s pretty hard to get a sensible take right now.
The left has disgraced itself so badly it is without credit at all.
The centre is non existent, and the right seems not to be in any mood for reflection at all. It’s a mad triumphalism before any real outcomes have been attained.
Samantha Bream asked some good questions of Tulsi, but got little back but rhetoric.
There’s certainly a lot of blame to go around here. Laying it all at Zelensky’s feet is simplistic.
FFS.
Use your words and explain it.
To me it feels right now like being in one of Orwells two minute hate sessions, and aside from being bored, it’s a bit worrying.
Reminds me of a relief day at childcare, long-time-ago.
4 year old Jax had his buddy by the throat as they tussled over a mathchbox toy, “I want that car,” he screamed. “Give me that car!”
“Now now, Jax,” his sweet carer crooned. “That isn’t the way we talk at kindy. Use your words.”
“Give me the f****ng car!”
(Sorry Arky.
As you were.)
As one commenter on the National Review said, “Republicans have become the “Give Peace a Chance” party, while Democrats, and seemingly the whole worldwide institutionalist structure, have become the war hawks.”
Zelensky has become the face of the forever war. He accepted Biden’s cash-for-proxy-war programme; he accepted Boris’ assurances that Europe would support the war well into the future; he wears army camo to the UN to guilt nations into contributing to prolonging the war; and his 10 point peace plan in 2022 was actually a victory plan.
Any “hate” going his way is well deserved. The war could have been over in My 2022 but Zelensky is the public face of the ongoing conflict. He’s happy that way and his puppet masters are happy too.
What does this mean?
At the point the Russian army rolled into the outskirts of Kiev… what?
What would you have done in his place?
Apparently, fled.
I spud” say I don’t respect Zelensky,as opposed to the Ukrainian people. And I thInk he has got too caught up in his image. But hate? No. I would not want to be in his situation. But it is also pretty clear he is corrupt.
NRO has thrown in the towel too. Neocons in shambles.
Couldn’t happen to a better class of people.
Let’s put the shoe on the other foot.
The Chinese and Mexicans come to a deal to put a couple of Chinese divisions and a missile base in Tijuana.
What happens next?
What are you talking about?
China has ICBMs.
They don’t need to station anything in Mexico.
I don’t know if you have noticed this thing called the belt and road.
China has already taken possession of ports, air bases and factories around the entire world, including billions of dollars in Mexican factories.
China is also in possession of thousands of square miles of land adjacent to almost every major military installation inside the USA.
US universities, like our own, graduate hundreds of thousands of Chinese students, who then go on to apply for permanent residence.
But go on with your theory of how the US would respond to a Chinese incursion in a neighbouring state.
See what happens if they try to put military stuff there.
I still have no idea what you are trying to say.
Are you saying the US tried to put nukes into Ukraine?
Exactly the opposite happened. Ukraine had nukes, and gave them up, under an agreement underwritten by NATO nations.
Are you saying the USA or someone else is putting divisions into Ukraine? Because despite three years of war, all NATO countries have strictly avoided even the appearance of doing that.
So what is the point you are trying to make in justifying the Russian invasion?
And it has to be said, in terms of proxy wars, the West has been particularly careful in not using it’s own personnel in country.
Unlike in Korea and Vietnam where the Chinese and Russians had their own pilots in the MIGs that were shooting down and directly killing US pilots.
.
How about you put some effort in in this discussion?
FMD, even our so-called smart people are as dumb as dogshit.
Peter Jennings, of Strategic Analysis Australia, tells Peter Credlin Zelensky’s dummy spit on Friday was JC Vance’s fault.
Jennings didn’t even notice the intervention of the Biden State Department neocons led by Victoria Nuland lobbying Zelinsky last week not to accept Trump’s minerals deal.
In other words, Putin’s puppet’s are actually the old Biden backroom gang — not Donald Trump.
The only thing I agree with Jennings on is that Australia has been free-riding on the USA militarily for half a century.
Dutton needs to shut up with his focus-group-tested idiocy siding with Zelensky against Trump and start committing the hundreds of billions of dollars necessary to prove to Trump we’re not free-riding bludgers.
The Chinese communists just proved to Australians that we have no national defence. Pull you finger out, Mr Potato Head.
Dutton certainly needs better foreign policy advisers.
Low hanging fruit.
Services Australia is the welfare super department created by the Coalition in 2004 and later expanded by Scott Morrison, inviting this wort of waste of taxpayer funds. The bigger the department, the bigger the budget, the bigger the rorts.
The Liberals have forgotten the principle of subsidiarity. In this instance, break it up into smaller parts that are more easily overseen by the ministers responsible.
Super departments suck. All they do is create extra layers of SES.
Ditto setting up efficency destroying empires to run things like tenders and grants, without ever actually having to run one of the program.
Peter Jennings was the executive director of the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI) from May 2012 to May 2022.
He has worked in senior roles in the Australian Public Service on defence and national security. He was Deputy Secretary for Strategy in the Defence Department (2009-12); Chief of Staff to the Minister for Defence (1996-98) and Senior Adviser for Strategic Policy to the Prime Minister (2002-03).
Peter led the ‘External Expert Panel’ appointed in 2014 to advise on the Defence White Paper, released in February 2016. Peter was a member of the Australia-Germany Advisory Group, appointed by the Prime Minister and German Chancellor in 2015 to develop closer bilateral relations. He has been a member of the Advisory Group on Australia-Africa Relations advising the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.
Peter has previously held several Senior Executive Service positions in Defence including First Assistant Secretary International Policy and First Assistant Secretary Coordination and Public Affairs, Deputy Director of the Defence Imagery and Geospatial Organisation and head of the Strategic Policy Branch. In 1999 Peter ran Defence’s East Timor Policy Unit, developing policy for the stabilization operation in East Timor.
Peter studied at the London Business School in 2000–2001 as a Sloan Fellow and was awarded a Masters of Science (Management) with Distinction. He has a Master of Arts Degree in International Relations from the Australian National University (1987) and a BA (Honours) in History from the University of Tasmania (1980–1984). He has been a Fulbright Fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1985).
Peter was awarded the Public Service Medal in the Australia Day 2013 Honours list. In February 2016 Peter was awarded the French decoration of Knight in the Order of Legion of Honour. In 2021 he was awarded a Commendation by the Foreign Minister of Japan for services to the bilateral relationship.
Peter has stepped down as ASPI Executive Director after a decade in the position in early May 2022.
Just another canbra pube with ‘generalist’ degrees- how could he not be part of the problem.
So this guy is a ‘military expert’ like Beasley I suppose- you do a course rather than actually joining one of the services and fight a war. How dare he criticize Vance.
Nobody is beyond criticism, milt, not even the Donald.
Since none of us has a God’s eye view of things we need different views presented so we can sort through them and get closer to the truth we’re trying to bring into focus.
I think that’s actually Trump’s methodology too. He’s an experimentalist, not a dogmatist in that regard.
Agree but criticism from pissants from canbra are an exception
That’s the genetic fallacy.
Their arguments stand or fall on their merits, not their origins.
we’ll have to agree to disagree on that one Roger
Save me from canbra nincompoops.
Mexico, and South America for that matter, have no history of wars killing millions of people, you big-noting, low-rent, limey dipshit. There are two very good reasons why the U.S. is entangled in Europe, both tied to events from the last century.
To prove the point further, the U.S. southern border has been left largely unattended due to generally good relations, so there’d be no reason to have nuclear weapons pointed at the U.S. from their territory.
Furthermore, there are countries that have also suffered invasion attempts, with France and the Low Countries being excellent examples. Poland is another. None of these places are suffering mental anguish or holding grievances.
U.S. nukes in Europe are small and meant for battlefield operations. Large, city-destroying weapons were removed after the end of the Cold War.
Posting nukes on the U.S. border would be completely different.
Now go play with your remote plane in the backyard, and don’t forget to wear your space cadet suit you bought from Kmart at a discount after Christmas.
After the back yard playtime, come back and demand I should be banned. You lowlife creep.
Nah, I’ll let you continue to demonstrate to the world what an idiot you are. The interwebs never forget.
The interwebs will certain forget you, you self -important lowlife limeball.
“How about the reverse, you self-important space cadet? If there’s one country whose borders have been ignored and rampant abuse has taken place, it’s the US. If anyone should have a real-life grievance against all those countries south of the border, it would be the US. According to your logic, the US should point ICBMs at all those countries and threaten them with nuclear annihilation if one more illegal immigrant is allowed to cross the border. Go fly your remote—or better yet, go write an angry letter to your local member.
Drunk already, you foul mouthed abusive little wop?
At least, I’m not a self-important, lowlife limy wog flying a remote plane and pretending you’re Australia’s answer to Elon Musk. Now fck off and stop groveling to me as it will never work. I have more respect for a dead rat.
And the real JC shows up…
I’m damn near speechless.
In fact I’ll go and have a shower and read the latest edition of Quadrant.
Trump isn’t a conservative, even though his modus operandi is cautious. Trump’s method is purely transactional – what is possible? What can I get done?
That’s why lefty activists have such trouble countering what he’s doing.
Lefties do whatever benefits the lefty tribe and rational thought doesn’t come into it; Trump does whatever makes sense and he’s supported by 60-80% of the American population.
That’s why the left is losing: its strategy is to do whatever it takes ideologically to subvert the dominant paradigm – not what makes sense.
Yes. He’s a pragmatist.
Vance is more a dogmatist.
We’ll fare much better under Trump than a POTUS Vance.
Nobody in our political class seems prepared for this possibility.
Precisely.
When one understands Trump is a businessman and makes deals, then his actions make sense.
Otherwise, the enemy is just floundering around in an ideological swamp and can’t understand why their feet are never on firm ground.
This track is not long enough. With that said, this along with the vision hits you in the guts.
“You, the mothers who sent their sons from faraway countries, wipe away your tears; your sons are now lying in our bosom and are in peace. After having lost their lives on this land they have become our sons as well.”
-Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
Gallipoli 2015 The Nek Soundtrack – Stephen Rae
Standing where the ANZAC trenches were, at the Nek, looking up at Baby 700, where the Turkish trenches were, is an experience that hits you fair in the guts.
“Up that slope, to the high ground? Fvck, never in a million years.”
Gina Rinehart slams Perth Festival organisers after Peter Garrett’s ‘trash’ commentsBethany HiattThe West Australian
Mon, 3 March 2025 3:59PM
Comments
WA mining magnate Gina Rinehart has slammed Perth Festival organisers and its key sponsors after rock legend Peter Garrett urged his audience to pretend they were dancing on her grave.
A spokesperson for the billionaire mining magnate revealed her sentiments for the first time after Garrett made the comments at his concert in Perth on Friday.
“The attention-seeking activist tried to trash Mrs Rinehart in front of thousands of people, but instead he ended up trashing himself and others who think, as Premier Roger Cook has said, ‘sowing the seeds of hatred’ is okay in the name of ‘art’,” the spokesperson said.
“That being the Perth Festival spokespeople and those mainly government organisations that sponsor it. Plus, a corporate misusing its shareholders’ money for this, and earlier divisive woke causes.”
During the Perth Festival show at East Perth Power Station, Garrett prompted his audience to “pretend they’re dancing on Gina Rinehart’s grave”.
Perth Festival is supported by some of WA’s biggest organisations, including the University of WA, Wesfarmers, the cities of Perth, Bayswater and Stirling, PAV and Perdaman.
What is this misusing its “shareholders’ money”.
It’sTAXPAYERS MONEY, AND IT’S A GROSS MISUSE OF IT!!!
It’s – IMHO – certainly actionable under the terms of the new hate Speech Laws.
Go for it, Gina.
Teach the old fart a lesson in civility.
Good on her- almost sound like incitement of violence against her.
Garrett is a poisonous waste of space.
The Ex-Minister for ‘The Batts Are Burning’. What a Fake.
Zelensky could re-set everything by announcing his road map to new elections.
Even if he doesn’t have any intention of following through with them.
He could, but at the end of the day it’s up to parliament.
He’s not a dictator.
I’m fairly sure Trump knows that, rhetoric notwithstanding.
Trump is spot on regarding the now almost continuous lawfare and insane fines imposed on US corporations by Eurocrats. It has been going on for decades. The EU is such an unweildy agglomeration of often disconnected semi-independent fiefdoms. The lawfare is often nothing to do with valid regulations or real events, it is initiated by US hating collectives.
While most outrages are overturned by the courts, it is a long and expensive process conducted in a lawless environment. Attacks on technology companies have the same intent as the constant attacks on the EU’s agricultural competitors. Destroy competition from non-EU enterprises that are more advanced and more competitive than the EU will ever be.
A full blown trade war will cripple the EU which would be a good outcome leading to repressed citizens rising up at last. The US doesn’t need a billion dollars worth of bottled water every year, nor a billion dollars worth of underwear, but the EU definately needs US technology and energy.
I think that Trump will pull the trigger.
Not that I have time for Microtheft but remember the EU fining MS for putting the browser in the OS?
And quite often that technology has Israeli origins.
Tin-Ear Keir goes to a phrase which, err, let’s say might be a bit tarnished.
OK.
Off you go.
We’ll hold your coat.
Oh.
Riiight.
Has he been in a monastery for the last three months?
Listen up.
Donald. Is. Not. Sending. Troops.
Or kit.
Or cash.
You’re on your own. You and the Frogs. Champ.
“You first Keir, we’re right behind you”
A bloody long way behind you.
A “coalition of the willing” is going to succeed where Napoleon and Hitler failed?
I don’t think so.
Europe is led by profoundly stupid, unserious and unpragmatic people.
I like how the poms talk about a ‘just’ peace- I assume they think that’s worth a few hundred more lives than just ‘peace’ on its own.
About time someone got ‘champed’ today, even if it is Starmer.
Question. Whose votes did Albanese think he was going to win by acting like a naughty schoolboy at the Faggot Festival?
Whose votes did he permanently lose?
A perpetual adolescent dick.
Or, as we say in my neck of the woods, a wanker.
Tom at 6:38.
There is something whiffy around this minerals thing.
As I said upthread, I reckon Zelensky has done some sort of under the table deal involving kickbacks, possibly to Dimocrats among others.
Trump knows this and is trying to kick the bucket over and see what falls out.
geriatric campus radicals Bons
Pip pip and huzzah to Starmer and his big words about European boots on the ground to protect an Ukraine ceasefire.
However it seems a bit ephemeral given his proviso that the US pays for it. Um sir, sir, I don’t think that’s going to happen sir.
Also, the presumption that there is a framework for a ceasefire that both sides would respect at this point is courageous.
Piss off Nazi grub
You lot?
Just opened the latest Quadrant – and found a gem.
Sweden’s ‘Moral Grandiosity”.
The unforeseen fruits of the grandiose tree are now real estate being advertised in areas where you can’t hear the grenades exploding.
The wooly headed Socialists who became so enamoured with Sweden’s ‘specialness and moral superiority’ are now reaping a dreadful harvest of reality from the invasion of the muslim hordes they invited in, protected and paid to reproduce at a rate that makes rabbits appear monkish.
Worth your time to read.
Yep. They are being forced to eat their own vomit.
urged his audience to pretend they were dancing on her grave.
I present to you two cases of leftist double standards and hypocrisy just in the last week. Firstly, we had a female NSW Labor Minister speak at an “Iranian Women’s Group’ meeting, a meeting sponsored by the mad Jew hating Iranian theocracy, and a meeting at which dumbo low IQ moron Fatso Payman also spoke. Both morons have subsequently apologised for attending/speaking at the event however the minister still has her job. Why? Does anyone seriously believe that if a Coalition minister had spoken at some equally fringe event he/she would still be in a job?
And now we have multi-millionaire far-leftist fckwit Peter Pan Garrett ask an audience to ‘pretend they’re dancing on Gina Rinehart’s grave‘. You could argue there’s incitement to violence in his words. And mark my word, Garrett means what he says but don’t worry, there’ll be no opprobrium for Garrett, it’ll all be forgotten next week. Of course if that had been someone from the right their career would already be in the toilet, venues would have cancelled gigs, online ticketing would have cancelled him/her, the screams and screeches from their ABC, the Guardian and all the rest of the MSM would be seen and heard on Pluto. Who recalls the screeches and howls against Alan Jones back in 2020 after his poorly chosen words about the utterly vile Jacinda Ardern?
The double standards and hypocrisy is never ending.
Don’t forget Cassie, if they didn’t have double standards they’d have no standards at all.
Oh look, the Nazi’s vomited up.
My take so far…
It looks like the deadsh*ts in our “conservative” media are all hot to plunge us into a hideous war because of a selectively reported meeting in the Oval Office. They are either too lazy to view the entire thing, or have done so and decided to go with the party line because mainstream approval.
They haven’t even bothered to investigate the back story including Z’s meeting with a group of warhawk Dems and others just prior.
This is beyond disgusting.
What next? Starmer hot to commit British lives to this lost cause. It will get them out of the UK so growing civil unrest at home can be dealt with by…cough…cough…plod. Euroweenies will puff adder but do nothing.
So what is Australia to do? Do we then commit troops because…reasons?
I can see us waltzing into a nightmare that anyone with an ounce of sense can predict. All because we have cowardly, puffed up, stupid politicians and an MSM, Sky included, who refuse to report the facts, only their insipid delusions.
Until the body bags start arriving. Then watch the finger pointing.
Both Albo and Dutton can’t see what is and has been going on.
The UKR financial and military support from Australia should be redirected to Domestic problems/issues. IMHO.
It is a European problem and nothing to do with Australia.
Look at what China is up to and start to deal with it.
My mate is adamant out of a division on paper of regular troops we would be lucky to field a combat brigade with armour in the field. That’s with ARes from 2nd Division filling holes.
We don’t have the manpower and Dutton knows that more than others, hence his monetary support comments.
Your mate is correct.
We have a putative Brigade on 24?hour recall, and then …. that’s it until we can call back to the colours the last five years worth of troops and support units that our illustrious leaders have pissed off and lost. And even then it will take two months to shake them down to a deployable second Brigade.
The third will have no kit, no armour, no MICV, apart from a couple of M113 scrounged from museums, no air defence, apart from the RAAF who won’t be allowed near anything dangerous because too expensive.
It will be an infantry unit with no artillery support.
Our current Military forces make our WW2 establishment look like world beaters.
Starmer has offered British troops to defend a truce brokered by the US.
He’s also said he’s spoken to Trump, who doesn’t want to put US troops on the ground and presumably would welcome the UK/EU standing up “in this space.”
There’s a lot of “misinformation” flying about. Let’s be cautious in the meantime.
As for ADF participation, it’s not in our direct sphere of interest but very much a task for the Europeans, so let’s hope common sense prevails among those who make such decisions.
If they try to send Australian Units to this European stuff up, I’ll be in the front of the protest marches even if I have to ride a pushbike all the way to Canberra.
Twice we’ve saved Europe from the grandiose wars their politicians have started.
Ah here we go.
When it comes to US politics Sharri is a Steve Bannon surrogate.
And now she unloads on JD Vance.
All because Steve Bannon hates Peter Thiel.
FMD.
FMD. Sharri Markson — a lefty even though she is also a Jew — is now campaigning for the sacking of JD Vance as US vice-president.
Give us a spell, Sharri, you smartarse knowall. Like Zelensky, you’re in over your head.
One of the best things about this Administration is that Trump has found a true second in command. A comrade at arms, and a flanker.
Amazes me that people like Sharri can’t understand that.
Military expert explains real reason for Trump’s outrage toward Zelenskyy
Sharri said that Trump supporters have been calling Zelensky antisemitic names.
I’m yet to see it and I see stuff on TikTok that would make a grampian nazi blush.
If Skynews is all in on another stupid forever war, looks like I’ll need to find something else to do with my time.
Correct. And what a stupid, pointless war.
But hey! Trump’s fault because he tried to broker peace to a leader who clearly wanted none of it.
I’m so over these loser journos.
They’re only any good within their narrow margins. Sharri has been good on Israel, she has a dog in the race.
This Vance stuff is just b/s on stilts.
Yep
First sensible commentary coming out
of Europe in while.
Europe’s reckless bid for victory
Why Islam Won’t Survive the 21st Century: A Quiet Collapse
The video discusses the transformative impact of the internet on Islam, drawing parallels to how the printing press affected Christianity in the past. The speaker, an ex-Muslim, argues that the internet facilitates questioning and criticism, undermining the rigid control over religious interpretation traditionally maintained by Islamic authorities. Historically, Islam has resisted change, discouraging critical thinking and often punishing apostasy harshly. However, platforms like Reddit and YouTube have created spaces where people can safely express doubts and share their journeys away from Islam, leading to a rise in apostasy. The video highlights that Islam’s growth is largely driven by high birth rates in underdeveloped regions, rather than conversion. In contrast, education and exposure to diverse ideas, particularly via the internet, are fostering skepticism and higher apostasy rates, particularly in more developed countries. Additionally, attempts by some Muslims to reinterpret or soften controversial aspects of Islam to fit modern values inadvertently contribute to its reformation, akin to Christianity’s evolution over centuries. Ultimately, the video suggests that rather than dramatic events, it is the pervasive access to information and free exchange of ideas online that are gradually causing a “quiet collapse” of traditional Islamic dogma, suggesting that this is how the religion might change significantly over time.
For a start, India and China will not allow radical Islam to flourish.
Nor Russia (Chechnya)
Australia’s richest person dishes out $100,000 prizes to workersBrad Thompson
1 hours ago.
Updated 2 minutes ago
The Australian Business Network
3 Comments
Australia’s richest person Gina Rinehart rewarded workers inside her private West Australian business empire with a multimillion-dollar giveaway to mark her belated birthday in Perth on Friday.
Mrs Rinehart gave away dozens of prizes each worth $100,000 to workers across her resources, energy, agriculture and workwear divisions.
The celebration for long-serving employees who have been with her companies for at least a decade was held at an undisclosed venue that doubled as a 71st event, although there is no sign the guest of honour appeared in person. The iron ore billionaire turned 71 on February 9.
Peter Garrett wasn’t on the guest list..
I’m reading that as work for Gina for 10 years and get a $100k bonus on her birthday?
is that right?
Little miss entropy, step up to the plate. NWWA FIFO isn’t that bad.
Grandstanding.
I could be wrong but I doubt Orange Hitler is up at 3:00 a.m. waiting for Sharri’s hot-take on who should be VP.
Ukrainian ambassador on with Sharri mentioned a victory plan, what they planned to do at the end of the war. I thought it was rather presumptuous when their only battle plan was asking the US every so often for more money and weapons.
Furthermore, when Sharri asked him why Zelensky didn’t apologise to Trump he said it’s because Zelensky is a wartime leader. Who knew you can be rude and offensive to those whose help you need if you are engaged in a war?
According to Sharri the whole Zelensky debacle is the fault of JD Vance. She wanted to know what he was even doing at the meeting in the White House. I expect he was invited by his boss.
There were lots of people in that room. I wondered if one of the women was Z’s wifey – there were two women on sofas opposite JDV
One of them was Ukraine’s ambassador. The one with her head in her hands.
>snork<