Wednesday

9.4 out of 10 based on 15 ratings

122 comments to Wednesday

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    If you are Australian this is about as devastating a look at the lucky country as I have heard. Matt Barrie
    giving the key note speech at the Aus Institute of Progress, in Brisbane, recently. Banks, housing, immigration, employment, the nannie state. How to hollow out a country in 80mins, with slides showing where we are at. Stomach turning. “Put another Aussi on the barbi.”

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

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      Kalm Keith

      I’ll watch that later in the afternoon when I can justify sipping a strong drink before tea.
      Over my life I’ve seen the Good in Australia, then from the early seventies the Bad and the Ugly that followed and is now firmly entrenched.
      How do we fix this when politicians have spent the last sixty years looking to feather their own nests and disempower “we the people ” from being able to correct and realign the nation’s direction.

      The only good news is a significant voter upheaval of the entrenched local government grabbers in the recent elections.

      Maybe there’s a turnaround.

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        Earl

        Little wonder the censorship bills are being put through when you get a presentation of this quality that brings all the threads together into a mosaic that needs the attention of every working class Australian.

        On Sunday 22 Sept I commented on how houses were being sold and immediately knocked down in my little corner of Brizvegas. Yesterday I noted another 2 vacant sections in the same 4 street radius then today at the 1hour mark of this presentation disturbing clarity is presented.

        I didn’t know that, in theory at least, foreigners can only buy new homes and that the old real estate trick to get around this is to insert a demolition of existing home a condition of sale.

        Also didn’t know that Australia is only 1 of 5 countries that does not require the RE industry to report suspicious transactions. And then the information that Transparency International rates Australia as the worst money laundering property market in the world. (1hour mark for the detail).

        Might I urge all to get this video link circulated to as many friends/family as possible.

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          David Maddison

          SEE MY POST #17. GOVERNMENT AND GREENS ARE FAST TRACKING CENSORSHIP BILL. SUBMISSIONS REQUIRED IN SIX DAYS.

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        • #
          Ronin

          Quite a few knockdown rebuilds in my area.

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          • #
            Earl

            18months to 2+ years ago amongst all the usual local selling (and house remains) there were 1 or 2 property demolitions followed by sub-division of the lot. It has only been in the last 3 months that suddenly we have increase in sale/demolished. Have you noted a local increase in same sort of time period? Cheers

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          Leo G

          I didn’t know that … foreigners can only buy new homes …

          Another way foreign corporates get around that rule involves proxy ownership contracts.

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      David Maddison

      I haven’t finished watching it yet but it is outstanding so far, and very, very disturbing.

      These are the sort of facts and figures the pretend conservative Liberal faction of the Uniparty should be quoting if they ever want to get into power. (They would be slightly less bad than Green Labor.)

      The video has a surpringly small number of views given that it’s been out three weeks. All Australians need to watch this and be VERY ALARMED.

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      David Maddison

      I have watched all of it now.

      This is the best analysis of what’s wrong with Australia that I have ever seen. Tragically, Australia has no Donald Trump-style leader in a major party who is willing or able to fix it. We really have only three conservative parties: United Australia Party, Libertarian Party and One Nation who would be prepared to correct this.

      I urge everyone to watch it and share the link.

      I wonder how long it will stay up before the e Safety Kommissar has it removed?

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      • #
        John Connor II

        I urge everyone to watch it and share the link.

        I wonder how long it will stay up before the e Safety Kommissar has it removed?

        Saved.

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      • #
        el+gordo

        ‘Australia has no Donald Trump-style leader in a major party …’

        Donald is an outlier and wouldn’t survive to lead a party, America has a different democracy.

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    • #
      Robber

      Drain the Swamp

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    • #
      David Maddison

      At what point do the actions of Uniparty politicians, especially the Green Labor faction, as described in this outstanding presentation, amount to treason?

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    • #
      Philip

      But! The worst news of this Matt Barrie fellow is, he is mates with Malcolm Turnbull. Which is bad because it means he mixes in the circles of power, so they have heard him talk. So, they know all about what he is saying, and still do nothing.

      I kind of wish he was just nobody on the internet, but he’s not.

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        David Maddison

        I am quite surprised he associates with a low life like Turnbull. I certainly wouldn’t if I was in his position. And as I have said before, I personally make a point of never associating with Leftists. It’s bad enough seeing them on Their ABC, so much worse in person.

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      • #
        Robert Swan

        Philip,

        … they know all about what he is saying, and still do nothing.

        This makes me think of the introduction to Fred Brooks’s classic The Mythical Man Month. Here’s a snippet:

        No scene from prehistory is quite so vivid as that of the mortal struggles of great beasts in the tar pits. In the mind’s eye one sees dinosaurs, mammoths, and sabertoothed tigers struggling against the grip of the tar. …

        … No one thing seems to cause the difficulty — any particular paw can be pulled away. But the accumulation of simultaneous and interacting factors brings slower and slower motion.

        Which might explain why the “circles of power” “do nothing”: they aren’t really in control at all.

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        Ronin

        Maybe it’s how he gets the inside info, observing the whiteants at work.

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    • #
      GlenM

      Got the message. Delivery was ordinary. Anyway we’re stuffed.

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      RickWill

      Just two items to start with:
      1. Stop all immigration.
      2. Stop all consumer mandated theft on energy supplies.

      The Columbian students is a good one. They could pay for a top notch education just getting one load of cocaine into the country.

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    MeAgain

    https://www.lusakatimes.com/2024/09/16/chief-mailo-hands-over-204-hectares-to-century-solar-africa-for-renewable-energy-project-in-serenje/ “The solar project in Serenje joins a growing list of solar energy initiatives in Zambia, which is moving towards renewable energy to reduce reliance on hydroelectric power.” – Zambia has coal and already regular load shedding. If you think this is frustrating in Australia, read the comments on this (one guy thinks they are probably just looking for Emeralds)

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  • #
    MeAgain

    Erdogan called out the Olympic opening as a perverse attack on families: https://gadebate.un.org/en

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    • #
      TdeF

      It’s ironic a muslim leader calling out Christian France as pagan and anti family and especially anti Christian. Even fifty years ago France was 90% Catholic and 60% communist.

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      • #
        Philip

        30% of Catholics weren’t communists? That’s surprising.

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        • #
          TdeF

          And the current Pope is an extreme socialist. America is evil. China is good. And the only thing worse than Hell fire is Global Warming. All religions are a pathway to God, which is really an odd thing to say. You may as well worship anything.

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      el+gordo

      Erdogan is a bad egg, with only one redeeming quality.

      ‘Russia completely disagrees with comments from Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan that Crimea should return to Ukrainian control.’ (Reuters)

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    David Maddison

    More woke insanity backfires.

    https://247sports.com/article/could-the-washington-commanders-bring-back-their-old-redskins-logo-236438406/amp/

    The family of the Blackfeet chief who served as the face of the Washington Redskins – now the Washington Commanders – want his image back on the fields of the NFL.

    The descendants of John Two Guns White Calf also want his life story retold, too, his family announced recently.

    “The fans want him back and we want him back,” Thomas White Calf, a great nephew of the chief, told Fox News this week by phone. The family reportedly met with Sen. Steve Daines, R-Montana.

    Two Guns White Calf’s portrait was a fixture on Washington’s helmets, T-shirts, uniforms, stadium fields, and fan gear from 1972 until 2020.

    “Our ancestor was the most famous and most photographed native in history,” said White Calf, who was joined on the call by his mother, Delphine White Calf, a niece of the late Blackfeet chief. “Two Guns was also the face on the Indian head nickel. I’m proud of him. The Blackfeet are proud of him.”

    Thomas White Calf, who lives on a Blackfeet reservation in Montana, says his family was never consulted and never supported the removal of his great uncle’s image from the NFL in 2020.

    The removal came after public pressure mounted to change the name that many viewed as a racial slur toward Native Americans.

    The National Congress of American Indians said in a statement at the time: “We commend the Washington NFL team for eliminating a brand that disrespected, demeaned, and stereotyped all native people,” and called on other teams like MLB’s Cleveland Indians to do something similar.

    SEE LINK FOR REST

    And is “redskin” really an offensive word?

    https://www.npr.org/sections/codeswitch/2013/09/09/220654611/are-you-ready-for-some-controversy-the-history-of-redskin

    But where did the word “redskin” come from? Many dictionaries and history books say the term came about in reference to the Beothuk tribe of what is now Newfoundland, Canada. The Beothuk were said to paint their bodies with red ochre, leading white settlers to refer to them as “red men.”

    According to Smithsonian historian Ives Goddard, early historical records indicate that “Redskin” was used as a self-identifier by Native Americans to differentiate between the two races. Goddard found that the first use of the word “redskin” came in 1769, in negotiations between the Piankashaws and Col. John Wilkins. Throughout the 1800s, the word was frequently used by Native Americans as they negotiated with the French and later the Americans. The phrase gained widespread usage among whites when James Fenimore Cooper used it in his 1823 novel The Pioneers. In the book, Cooper has a dying Indian character lament, “There will soon be no red-skin in the country.”

    SEE LINK FOR REST

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    • #
      James Murphy

      The people most offended by a Native American face will likely say that the descendants are not able to understand what “real” racism is, for whatever reasons.

      I guess if one wants lessons on racism, there are no better experts than those offended by such imagery and names.

      These professional racists also manage to instantly associate a cartoon monkey (on a breakfast cereal box) with black people, whereas normal people see a cartoon monkey and think no more about it…

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      • #
        TdeF

        And an aboriginal PhD in Australia who campaigned to change Coon cheese as he felt it was obviously racist. It was named after Kraft’s Dr. Coon who in 1928 invented and patented the fast fermentation process which made the cheese possible and in his honour. The objector does not believe this fact, which is easily verified. So much for the PhD.

        Coon is not a racist word and nothing to do with racoons, which are no black anyway. The Coon family in America is a white family. And this in a country where you cannot buy white bread or ask for black coffee? And they were supposed to make racist white cheese?

        So fantasy became reality and was banned?

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      OldOzzie

      Red Ripperz (formerly Redskins or Red Skins) are a red, raspberry-flavoured chewy confectionery manufactured in Australia by Nestlé under their Allen’s brand.

      The confectionery is sold as elongated bars which are individually twist-wrapped in paper, weighing approximately 10 grams each, although smaller sizes exist.

      Branding controversy

      ‘Redskin’ has been considered a racist term for Native Americans and First Nations Canadians since at least the 1800’s.[1][2]

      In 1996, a complaint was made to the New Zealand Advertising Standards Complaints Board about a Redskins advertisement aired on New Zealand television. The advertisement featured comedian Mark Wright dressed in Native American clothing and assuming an accent. A mock drumbeat featured on the soundtrack. Despite protest from Nestlé New Zealand that the advertisement was inoffensive, the board upheld the complaint.[3]

      Red Skins packaging formerly featured a drawing of a Native American wearing a traditional headdress. This was replaced in the late 1990s by a more neutral red character.

      In June 2020, along with Chicos, Nestlé announced that the name will be changed to “represent the inclusive nature of modern society”.

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  • #

    Maine’s massive “floating wind” folly — my report
    By David Wojick
    https://www.cfact.org/2024/09/23/maines-massive-floating-wind-folly-my-report/

    Here are two excerpts:

    1. “My research report — Maine’s Massive “Floating Wind” Folly — is up on the Net Zero Reality Coalition’s webpage hosted by CFACT which sponsored the research. See https://www.cfact.org/netzerorealitycoalition/, which has a lot of other research reports as well. Below is my Executive Summary, followed by the latest bad news on this ongoing silly saga.

    This report examines several fundamental aspects of the State of Maine’s offshore wind development plan. It is divided into two parts. Part 1 examines certain economic issues, such as feasibility, cost, and progress to date. Part 2 explores the proposed development as it relates to the entire Gulf of Maine, namely because the project has not advanced to the point where the State of Maine’s responsibilities have been defined.

    The offshore wind plan calls for development of 3,000 MW of generating capacity, an amount that is roughly double Maine’s average electricity usage. The viability of Maine’s offshore wind plan depends entirely on the massive transformation of the state’s grid from fossil fuel use to electrification. It is clear that the citizens of Maine have not been informed of this vast transformation requirement. They have certainly not approved it. The offshore wind facilities will consist of great numbers of “floating turbines” operating at a scale and degree of reliability that hasn’t been verified to work in the real world. Such an assumption makes the entire plan not only technologically speculative but also enormously risky.”

    2. “BOEM has scheduled the Gulf of Maine lease sale for October 29, 2024, just before the elections. They are trying to beat the clock since President Trump has promised to kill offshore wind if elected. Of course, they may also try to award leases before the inauguration because the development of awarded leases is much harder to stop.

    Note that at the end of the Executive Summary above, I discuss BOEM, including the leasehold sonar surveys in the Environmental Assessment (EA). That was promised in the draft EA, but in the final EA, just published to make way for the quick sale, that assessment was completely dropped. No doubt, this was to avoid the new findings that sonar surveys can cause whale deaths in large numbers.

    If Trump wins, I would like to see a separate Transition Team for BOEM handing out resignation letters. BOEM’s blatant disregard for whale deaths is despicable.”

    Lots more in the article. Please share it.

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    Graham Richards (or NOT! Who really said this?)

    “Australia could add more than 7GW of new renewable energy capacity this year, as Labor premiers give Peter Dutton the cold shoulder on nuclear.”

    But

    World’s biggest banks just nuked Harris/Biden’s ‘Green New Deal’ dream
    https://revolver.news/2024/09/biggest-banks-nuke-harris-biden-green-new-deal-dream/

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    • #
      David Maddison

      Politicians need to be taken to account when they promote new wind and solar plantation capacity.

      They quote only nameplate capacity.

      If it’s wind it’s only 30% of 7GW (as Tony has determined accurate capacity factors for Australia) so it’s only 2.1GW at best.

      In fact, it’s not even that because non-dispatchable power should not be counted at all.

      So 7GW claimed is actually ZERO. The only capacity that counts is 24/7 dispatchable and no Big Battery or even the energy-consuming SH2 (if ever finished) can deliver beyond minutes or hours for any decent amount of power.

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      • #
        Graeme4

        If you take the 7GW as combination solar and wind, the CF is around 23%, so only 1600 MW, which is 457 watts for each of the claimed 3.5 million households, all of which would want a bit more electricity during the peak morning and evening times. Have to keep saying that power usage doesn’t work on averages.

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    • #
      Graham Richards

      This is not my comment Jo!!!

      You must be having some problems on your system!!

      [I’m looking into it! – Jo]

      [They use your email address, but the IP comes from Tasmania — Launceston 7250, whereas yours comes from Brisbane. That is odd? – Jo]

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    • #
      RickWill

      7GW of new renewable energy capacity this year

      That is a forecast. So far installed is 3.1GW of rooftops and 2.6GW of grid scale. I expect the rooftops will still be ahead for the whole year.

      Midday last Sunday, rooftops supplied 47% of the NEM demand. The electricity grid in Australia is in decline. It was inevitable from the time the first WDG was permitted to connect on far more favourable terms than dispatchable generators.

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      • #
        Graeme4

        Today, perhaps. Who knows what will happen tomorrow? The grid will always have to exist to provide reliable power. As Dutton says, you cannot run an electricity system with unreliable energy sources – would have thought that was obvious by now.

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      Graeme No.3

      Not sure about the article – it may give The Greenies ideas on wasting more money.
      “If they can sell investments for climate change solutions, why not raise money to increase the Leprechaun population? Or to develop supplements letting mermaids stay longer on land? ”

      We will know if we see SAVE THE LEPRECHAUNS posters and TV adds or LAND RIGHTS FOR MERMAIDS.

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  • #
    David Maddison

    Australian medical doctor Nitchschke had his first customer for his suicide pod in Switzerland.

    Who said Aussie manufacturing is finished? We can become world leaders in suicide machinery. /SARC

    https://www.skynews.com.au/world-news/global-affairs/american-woman-64-dies-in-switzerland-as-first-person-to-use-controversial-sarco-suicide-capsule-created-by-australianborn-doctor/news-story/049b077bd89b37c4d4859124b3569bab

    American woman, 64, dies in Switzerland as first person to use controversial Sarco ‘suicide capsule’ created by Australian-born doctor

    A number of arrests have been made after an American woman was the first person to use a “suicide capsule” made by an Australian doctor.

    An American woman has become the first person to use an Australian-made “suicide capsule”, sparking multiple arrests in northern Switzerland where she is said to have died under a canopy of trees.

    The woman, 64, died in the pod on Monday near a forest hut in Merihausen after reportedly suffering with a serious illness.

    It marks the first use of the controversial capsule, dubbed the “Tesla of euthanasia”, which works by releasing nitrogen gas into the pod, replacing the oxygen.

    SEE LINK FOR REST

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    • #
      Philip

      That’s old Dr Death from the NT all those years ago is it not?

      I know someone whose wife went to Switzerland to terminate her life. Had muscular waste disease or something terminal.

      It’s amazing how many people support this idea, not just radical lefties. People have a compassion for suffering and see it the same as we do with animals. Vets are always very keen to “put her down”. When my beloved dog got ill, I said to the vet only if you give me a shot as well. But her suffering wasn’t bad, otherwise I would have.

      But my mother is as socially conservative as you can get, and at 85, and a real worker, can’t sit still and hates not being physically able and the associated pain. She fears just being a vegetable just breathing and not knowing what is going on. She’d take the pod option.

      But there’s something about it that freaks me out. Apparently in Canada the officials are quite persuasive at getting people to take the shot. One can easily see it getting way out of control.

      Iirc, Dr Death has a customer in the NT who actually had no terminal illness at all but was a real party girl and found life boring in her 60’s so she opted out. Not really the idea my dear!

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        Yarpos

        Not your idea clearly, but people have vey different ideas about how to live their lives, and hiw their lives will end.

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        KP

        “my mother… at 85…fears just being a vegetable just breathing and not knowing what is going on. She’d take the pod option. ”

        Come and tell us about it when you’re the same age…

        How many stroke victims would want to continue life as a burden on their loved ones and incapable of doing anything, how many dementia sufferers who realise what they have become in a moment of lucidity? Mum died this year at 99, still at home and healthy, for a broad meaning of that word, but she was just over living. Friends, relations all dead, a world changed so much she couldn’t understand the motivations of the people in it, she’d seen so many things repeat time and time again she was bored with everything from politicians to celebrities to wars.

        There are worse things in life than being dead, and luckily they are mainly at the end of it.

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      John Connor II

      We can become world leaders in suicide machinery.

      Exporting the Albo government?

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        Graeme No.3

        But would Switzerland let them in?

        I mean after South American Dictators, Russian Oligarchs and Drug Dealers the Swiss might draw the line to our lot.

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        Yarpos

        Maybe an off shoot of UHaul? the have e expertise in one way journeys.

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    • #
      Ronin

      Easing the transition to the next world.

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  • #
    another ian

    FWIW

    “Pray
    [Comments enabled]
    … that we don’t need to actually use our military.

    In, you know, an actual war. When people shoot back. Not this BS “bomb that guy” game, when the range is two-way and they’re shooting at us.

    Why?”

    https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=252087

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    KP

    The current world’s problems explained-

    “According to the American economist and social philosopher, Thomas Sowell… “The most fundamental fact about the ideas of the political left is that they do not work. Therefore we should not be surprised to find the left concentrated in institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive.”

    Recent experience in New Zealand can testify to the truth of that quote.

    As the new Coalition Government struggles to pick up the pieces, the two politicians largely responsible for the carnage – former Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and former Deputy PM and Minister of Finance Grant Robertson – have moved into positions “where ideas do not have to work in order to survive.”

    Dame Jacinda Ardern is now leading a Field Fellowship to “rehumanise leadership” and “bring more hope and optimism into politics” at the Washington-based Center for American Progress Action Fund.

    And Grant Robertson is now the Vice Chancellor of Otago University.

    Both will no doubt be spreading their Marxist ideas onto those organisations, poisoning rational thought with the failed ideology of socialism.”

    Dr Muriel Newman at the NZCPR.

    https://www.nzcpr.com/in-search-of-solutions/

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      Leo G

      … institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive.

      Where rules the DEI of ideas- providing a conceptual framework for the fair treatment and full participation of ideas underrepresented because of their disability or cultural dissonance.

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  • #
    YYY Guy

    Last week

    The NT Police Commissioner who claimed earlier this year that he had never seen racism in the police force has offered a sweeping public apology to Indigenous Territorians for “past harms and injustices” inflicted on them over the past 150 years at the hands of the NT Police, while committing to “eliminating racism” in the force under his command.

    This week
    RTWT
    We smell money

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    David Maddison

    Forty shilling freeholders. This was the idea that in order to have a right to vote you had to have a certain value of property. What do you think of some variation of this idea in modern Western democracies? The problem now is that political parties are in competition with each other to see who can give away the most welfare in order to secure votes. This applies to corporate welfare as well (i.e. protection from market forces ensuring that industry has no incentive to become efficient). Ultimately there will be so many people voting themselves funds from the public coffers there will be no incentive to produce. (We are almost at that point now.) If voters had some interest in owning some amount of property this would not be such an issue.

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      KP

      ..and that’s what happened to Communism, the ultimate expression of the Socialist Left!

      Democracy is failed experiment, a hopeless system, but people cling to it and keep quoting some other failed drunk who apparently said it was better than all the others..

      Well, have your one man one vote, but give two votes to anyone with a science degree, three votes to anyone employing 10people or more and no vote at all for any Govt employee! We need to get the productive back in control, or we will end up just like the countries all the immigrants are coming from!

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    David Maddison

    ***** IMPORTANT NEW DEVELOPMENT *****

    AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT CENSORSHIP BILL

    Very important message from Senator Babet.

    They are calling for more submissions but with the help of the GREENS they are fast tracking the bill and you only have SIX DAYS to make a submission.

    There were was a previous call for submissions and 23,000 were made, all totally ignored.

    My previous submission is at:

    https://www.infrastructure.gov.au/sites/default/files/documents/acma2023-31735-david-s-maddison.pdf

    See Senator Babet’s message and links:

    https://yzcjgi-zgpvh.campaign-view.com/ua/viewinbrowser?od=3z91c91af84af2658f15e7a977c5f0200109c15146e82ae1bde514f730bf6fe0c2&rd=162781fa42316284&sd=162781fa422e56f6&n=11699e4c35258f0&mrd=162781fa422e56e4&m=1

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      David Maddison

      Why do you think it’s being fast tracked?

      What’s coming up they want to suppress?

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      • #
        John Connor II

        Why do you think it’s being fast tracked?

        What’s coming up they want to suppress?

        Y’know, I just typed up 3 paragraphs for Jo’s ACMA post today, then I deleted it.

        Best you don’t even ask.
        A world changing event maybe?
        Disclosures that could destroy the govt?
        Both of the above?
        /hints
        Be sure to watch ABC news for the truth.😆

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    OldOzzie

    JUDITH SLOAN

    Why dumb politics has finally killed off smart policy

    Former treasurer and prime minister Paul Keating had many good lines. But my favourite is this: good policy is good politics. It might not have the invective flair of some of his others but it is a very important proposition that guided most of his political life.

    Sadly, we have come to a point in our history where it is difficult to sustain the accuracy of the statement. Now it’s all about politics, with good policy being regarded as a secondary consideration or not relevant at all. The decline in the quality and the fragmentation of media coverage have facilitated this shift.

    Upon the recent release of the National Accounts, which revealed extremely weak economic growth, Chalmers leapt to the bizarre conclusion that “without government spending, there would be no growth in the economy”.

    It clearly didn’t occur to him that government spending is impacting on other spending in the economy, in particular investment but also consumption.

    Nor did he care to mention that we have had six quarters of declining per capita growth, an outcome associated with the inflation unleashed in part by government spending as well as excessive growth of the population.

    For Chalmers, it’s all about politics, about avoiding the emergence of a technical recession – two successive quarters of negative growth. He is also curiously dismissive of the slump in productivity. The National Accounts revealed productivity is now back to the 2016 level, having fallen by a massive 0.8 per cent in the June quarter.

    But when Chalmers was questioned about this outcome, he batted the topic away, declaring it was a long-term issue, and that the government is (apparently) working on it.

    He utterly fails to understand the central role productivity plays in promoting higher living standards.

    Without a pick-up in growth, the Reserve Bank will have little choice but to keep interest rates higher for longer.

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      another ian

      O O

      Winston Churchill

      ““I contend that for a nation to try to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle.”

      So re “Upon the recent release of the National Accounts, which revealed extremely weak economic growth, Chalmers leapt to the bizarre conclusion that “without government spending, there would be no growth in the economy”.

      Seeing as the government money comes from taxation doesn’t that put his government as riding on the shoulders of the man in the bucket?

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    YYY Guy

    Old timers might remember The Six Million Dollar Man, Lee Majors, stronger, faster, higher.
    Inflation brings you The $11 Billion Dollar Woman
    I know a small number of crypto investors who invested about $1000 each. Their returns were $30 per week, $1500 per year, which is a $150% return (I think). None of them knew how it all happened but they had money in the bank. I’m still puzzled, money making money.

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    Censorship is always a key step in finalising the Fascist take-over of any country and Australia will not escape that fate unless the population mobilised to cut the Evil Ones off at the Pass.

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    Graham Richards

    This “ surge in immigration “ is no doubt very strongly influenced by demands from the WEF & the “ secret “ agreements we all know our governments, on all sides of the political aisle
    enter into. One side of politics, ie, the ALP, is particularly in favour of these agreements as we can see from actions of foreign minister Wong & her inclination to fund terrorist organisations thru the UN, and welcome members of Hamas as migrants. Nearly 80% of the Palestinian population in Gaza are Hamas supporters and here we go importing potential terrorism!!

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    YYY Guy

    In cost of living news, big riser on the ASX this morning is Cettire Ltd, up 79%!! –

    Cettire Limited is an Australia-based global online retailer. The Company is engaged in offering a selection of in demand personal luxury goods via its Website, cettire.com. It has access to an extensive catalogue of more than 2,500 luxury brands and 500,000 products of clothing, shoes, bags, and accessories. It sells a range of products from over 500 designers, which include a range of women’s and men’s wear from brands, such as Prada, Gucci, Saint Laurent, Balenciaga, and Valentino, among others. The Company’s product categories include clothing, shoes, bags, and accessories. Its clothing category offers activewear, coats, jackets, jeans, knitwear, pants, and various others. Its shoes category offers boots, espadrilles, lace-up shoes, loafers, and various others. The Company’s bags category offers bag accessories, belt bags, clutch bags, crossbody bags and various others. The Company also offers accessories, such as belts, glasses, gloves, hats, and various others.

    Have a look at the link and click on something you might buy and the eye-watering prices.
    You’ll see the fashions at the next politicians ball.
    I smell a rat –

    Auditor not happy to sign off on the accounts because of revenue recognition issues.

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    John Connor II

    How 3M Executives Convinced a Scientist the Forever Chemicals She Found in Human Blood Were Safe

    Decades ago, Kris Hansen showed 3M that its PFAS chemicals were in people’s bodies. Her bosses halted her work. As the EPA now forces the removal of the chemicals from drinking water, she wrestles with the secrets that 3M kept from her and the world.

    Several of 3M’s most successful products contained man-made compounds called fluorochemicals. In a spray called Scotchgard, fluorochemicals protected leather and fabric from stains. In a coating known as Scotchban, they prevented food packaging from getting soggy. In a soapy foam used by firefighters, they helped extinguish jet-fuel fires. Johnson explained to Hansen that one of the company’s fluorochemicals, PFOS — short for perfluorooctanesulfonic acid — often found its way into the bodies of 3M factory workers. Although he said that they were unharmed, he had recently hired an outside lab to measure the levels in their blood. The lab had just reported something odd, however. For the sake of comparison, it had tested blood samples from the American Red Cross, which came from the general population and should have been free of fluorochemicals. Instead, it kept finding a contaminant in the blood.

    A graph appeared on the mass spectrometer’s display; it suggested that there was a compound in the blood that could be PFOS. That’s weird, Hansen thought. Why would a chemical produced by 3M show up in people who had never worked for the company?

    What Hansen didn’t know was that 3M had already conducted animal studies — two decades earlier. They had shown PFOS to be toxic, yet the results remained secret, even to many at the company. In one early experiment, conducted in the late ’70s, a group of 3M scientists fed PFOS to rats on a daily basis. Starting at the second-lowest dose that the scientists tested, about 10 milligrams for every kilogram of body weight, the rats showed signs of possible harm to their livers, and half of them died. At higher doses, every rat died. Soon afterward, 3M scientists found that a relatively low daily dose, 4.5 milligrams for every kilogram of body weight, could kill a monkey within weeks. (Based on this result, the chemical would currently fall into the highest of five toxicity levels recognized by the United Nations.)

    In a few years, when the EPA begins enforcing the new regulations, local utilities will be required to test their water and remove any amount of PFOS or PFOA which exceeds four parts per trillion — the equivalent of one drop dissolved in several Olympic swimming pools. 3M has produced enough PFOS and chemicals that degrade into PFOS to exceed this level in all of the freshwater on earth. Meanwhile, many other PFAS continue to be used, and companies are still developing new ones. Thousands of the compounds have been produced; the Department of Defense still depends on many for use in explosives, semiconductors, cleaning fluids and batteries. PFAS can be found in nonstick cookware, guitar strings, dental floss, makeup, hand sanitizer, brake fluid, ski wax, fishing lines and countless other products.

    https://www.propublica.org/article/3m-forever-chemicals-pfas-pfos-inside-story

    A lengthy read but well worth it.

    /better post this while I can.
    /hint

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    OldOzzie

    Electric Cars

    The EV Graveyard

    I & I Editorial Board – September 24, 2024

    Last week, the House approved a resolution to block the Biden administration’s emissions rule that would require more than half of the automobiles sold in the new-car market to be electric by 2032.

    The 215 representatives who voted for the bill, including eight Democrats, are far more in tune with most of the country than the White House. The “deplorables” and “bitter” clingers of the industrialized world are rejecting electric vehicles.

    Nationwide, the inventory of unsold EVs had grown by nearly 350% over the first half of 2024, creating “a 92-day supply — roughly three months’ worth of EVs, and nearly twice the industry average,” says Axios, which is 54 days for gasoline-powered vehicles.

    Ford, which lost nearly $73,000 on each EV it sold in the second quarter of 2023, continues to yield to reality, now ditching its plans to build a large electric SUV. This “course change,” says Just the News, “comes amid lower-than-expected demand for electric vehicles.”

    And here’s the market’s message:

    “Of the U.S. consumers planning on purchasing a new vehicle in the next 24 months, only 34% intend to purchase an EV, down 14% from 48% in the 2023,” says Ernst & Young’s Mobility Consumer Index, “a global survey of almost 20,000 consumers from 28 countries.”

    The story is much the same in Britain. EVs “are losing value at an ‘unsustainable’ rate as a slowdown in consumer demand sends used car prices tumbling,” the Telegraph reported last week. Meanwhile in France, “the EU’s second largest market for battery electric vehicles behind Germany,” deliveries have fallen by a third.

    Germans are likewise losing interest, as the country has “suffered a ‘spectacular’ drop in electric car sales as the European Union faces growing calls to delay its net zero vehicle targets,” the Telegraph said in a separate story.

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    another ian

    FWIW

    “Gaza cash laundry – brought to you by P Wong and Australia’s Labor Party”

    https://twitter.com/i/status/1717063657471824280

    https://www.michaelsmithnews.com/2024/09/gaza-cash-laundry-brought-to-you-by-p-wong-and-australias-labor-party.html

    A handy little gadget there

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      John Connor II

      True enough!

      What the world needs to do is mind their own damn business, look after their own countries and let others sort out their own problems.
      Dawg knows every country has enough on their own plate to address.

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        Yarpos

        Mmmmmm a multipolar world as some call it

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        Steve of Cornubia

        As much as I hate our military being used to fight on behalf of other nations, I recognise the need, now and then, to push back against the likes of China. What should we do when they invade Taiwan? What about if they then move into the Phillipines? Vietnam? Vanuatu?

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    another ian

    Maybe use this legal term to help reduce moderation?

    “This is pure ipse dixit. (A legal term for bullsh*t.)”

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    el+gordo

    Long Wave Downward Radiation.

    ‘Proponents of anthropogenic global warming (AGW) claim CO2’s LWDR forcing is the factor driving modern climate change. However, if the CO2 forcing contribution to LWDR is 150 times smaller than the error in calculating the surface background LWDR, then there can be no valid attribution assessment for CO2 forcing in LWDR trends.’ (Notrickszone)

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      RickWill

      LWDR does not exist. There is no way radiant energy can travel against the electric potential. Radiation is shorthand for Electro-Magnetic Radiation. It cannot transfer energy against the electric potential. Temperature is an expression of electric potemntial in matter. So EMR cannot go from cold to hot – always the other way.

      Removing the brackets in the Stefan-Boltzmann equation to separate the two temperature terms is a algebraic result that has now physical significance. The two terms, physically, always exist inside the brackets.

      Ice is the dominant atmospheric phenomena that has by far the greatest influence on the transmission of EMR. It controls how much EMR gets thermalised and how much long wave radiation goes out. The precise temperature of transformation from water to ice or ice to water ensures Earth’s surface temperature has a narrow range. Ocean surface exists between the sustainable limits of -1.7C and 30C. Average, near enough, is the middle of the range, say 14C.

      So people purporting to measure something that cannot physically exist are bound to come up with anything they like.

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    John Connor II

    JC2 tech tips corner

    How to save youtube videos.
    For Android, I use NewPipe, which you can find easily enough. Works very well.
    You may need to permit sideloading the .apk though.

    To save twitter videos, use TWSaver (.com)
    Others have come and gone and had issues.
    It handles source and referrer code too so you don’t need to prune that off.

    For Reddit, you can use Rapidsave (.com)

    For other video hosting platforms like Bitchute you can use Savethevideo (.net)

    For embedded videos on Tumblr and others, it gets more complex so that’s another day.

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    John Connor II

    The Crisis of the Greens and the Future of the Left

    Make no mistake about it: If you live in a developed Western democracy, you have spent the last decades wrestling with the insanity of the Greens. This is true whether or not your political system has allowed this noxious force to condense into a specifically named Green Party, or whether – as in the United States – the Greens exist instead as a nebulous, diffuse faction within your progressive establishment. Whatever the politics of your country, the Greens have specific features that make them easy to identify. They are worried about carbon emissions, they cast themselves as defenders of the rights of racial and sexual minorities, they support mass migration, they believe ardently in technological progress and they cultivate a distinctly internationalist political outlook. Those are the Greens I’m talking about.

    I have been thinking a lot about the Greens since their drubbing in the recent German elections. Something strange and unexpected is happening to them – something that even two years ago I wouldn’t have predicted. They are bleeding support; they are on the defensive and suddenly everybody hates them. In East Germany you could even say that they are in outright collapse. The party of the future, the party of the youth, the party at the cutting edge of progressivism, is now withering on the vine. And I suspect that this is not just happening in Germany. It may be happening here faster than it is in other countries, but the Greens are an international phenomenon, and Green politics are in trouble in many places beyond the Federal Republic.

    https://www.eugyppius.com/p/the-crisis-of-the-greens-and-the

    Paywalled, but the Greens and loony left seem to be in terminal decline which no doubt explains a lot, like censoring everything to hide their failures and looming crises of which there’ll be a few. Protect themselves first and screw everyone else. The political way.. 😎

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      Graeme No.3

      In Australia they benefit from being a vote against the two major parties, about half (or more) of their share of the vote.
      This leads stupid people in the 2 major parties to pander to them, hoping that they will benefit from their preferences. That means that even more people vote for them as a protest against those dumb ideas.
      A sort of “throw some peasants overboard for the wolves, until the wolves come after them”.

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    John Connor II

    Bank of Canada scraps plan to create a ‘digital dollar’ 

    Despite spending years taking steps toward its creation, the Bank of Canada is now saying it will not be pursuing the release of a central bank digital currency.

    Officials from Canada’s central bank said that a digital currency, or electronic “loonie,” will no longer be considered after years of investigating bringing one to market.

    “The Bank has undertaken significant research towards understanding the implications of a retail central bank digital currency, including exploring the implications of a digital dollar on the economy and financial system, and the technological approaches to providing a digital form of public money that is secure and accessible,” the bank said, according to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

    Instead of using resources to create a digital dollar, the central bank said it will instead look at evolving the “payment” processes in Canada.

    https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/bank-of-canada-scraps-plan-to-create-a-digital-dollar/

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    • #
      KP

      Sounds like orders came from just South of the border as the Digital Dollar would not mesh with the World Currency conveniently..

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    Earl

    Is that the ghost of Sally MacDonald standing in the shadows of the shopping trolleys?

    Finally, the new Woollies CEO breaks cover, she probably wishes she hadn’t and is confronted in a Wollongong supermarket by a well informed and “young” female shopper. [Maybe time to review the oxymoron status as in well informed young].

    Anyway the “thank you for reaching out to us…” prefixed response was no more digestible than the long stalks that supermarkets (not just Woollies) leave on broccoli bunches. Let’s talk some more in 7-9 months.

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      Simon Thompson M.B. B.S.

      broccoli stalks are edible… if you like eating vegetables.

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      • #
        Skepticynic

        >broccoli stalks
        Skin them to remove the green.
        Cube the white stuff.
        Beautiful eaten raw or cooked.

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          Earl

          ST/S yes and skinning is the secret to get rid of outer rind stringy bit. Maybe we need a weights and measures standard for length and (I’m guessing) more promotion of the use. Cheers

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            Annie

            We always eat our broccoli stalks and give the outer skin and dried base to the sheep along with other vegetable and fruit trimmings.

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    el+gordo

    In the past week Putin has been testing some of the engines in his nuke arsenal, four were duds and only one got off the ground. No worries.

    “According to Ukrainian intelligence, (the) Kremlin is preparing strikes on Ukrainian nuclear energy critical objects ahead of winter,” (Reuters)

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      KP

      “ESG I’d dead, but not for the reasons you think”

      We’re all old enough to have heard it all before-

      “companies cannot thrive on a planet suffering from cascading crises and unmanageable risks. Yet, despite decades of corporate commitments, businesses continue to damage the planet,..We urgently need a change of mindset and a fundamental redesign of the markets that frame business decisions…This will require a critical mass of businesses to push for government action —…The market must be redesigned to eliminate the tension between profitability and sustainability. ”

      Another wannabee billionaire saying we need Govt to take over business with ‘my model’ so sustainability becomes the most important driver, not profit.

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      Graeme4

      Tony Irwin seems to be missing the point that the main renewable’s cost is the backup storage, which is the $1T or more component. The costs of the renewables and extra transmission lines ($135bn) are minor in comparison.

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    another ian

    FWIW

    “The answer, my friends, sure ain’t blowin’ in the wind”

    Looks like there might be a whole ‘nother saga in “cut in speeds” and “the wind that wasn’t there” that I haven’t noticed mentioned on the Oz context

    https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/the-answer-my-friends-sure-aint-blowin-in-the-wind/

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    another ian

    FWIW

    “This is Nigel Farage’s time”

    “He closed the conference by telling his standing ovation audience that Reform UK had come of age. I thought yes, but that’s because you have come of age. ‘Nothing is more powerful than a man whose time has come’, if you will forgive the deliberate Victor Hugo misquote.

    And Nigel Farage’s time has come. He’s an irresistible force that neither the sneering nor the sniping of the BBC or Sky News can halt, any more than the Telegraph and Spectator can deny what he now is – the word I couldn’t find – the political phenomenon of our time.”

    https://www.conservativewoman.co.uk/nigel-farages-time-has-come/

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    another ian

    FWIW

    “Why have eco-warriors gone to war with a rural Irish pub?”

    Read it all!

    https://www.spiked-online.com/2024/09/23/why-have-eco-warriors-gone-to-war-with-a-rural-irish-pub/

    10