As one of the pipers for the Australian War Memorial, I get a unique view of the crowds around the Pool of Reflection during the daily ritual that is the Last Post Ceremony. Invariably, the faces are solemn and reflective. Not infrequently there are tears. On the way out, I move with the crowd. The Continue reading »
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In terms of the long-term survival of our species, the ritualisation of war the First Peoples of Australia achieved should be celebrated as a great advancement in human relationship. Rather than just celebrating the longevity and attachment to land of aboriginal people, we need to recognise that all their various cultures achieved one of the Continue reading »
At the heart of setting the age of the qualifying child for Parenting Payment (PP) is the question: when should a sole parent cease to be treated as a person whose primary responsibility is to care for children and more like a person seeking paid work? Sole parents are, due to the absence of a Continue reading »
’You cannot serve God and mammon’. Make your choice. I have been proud to be a management consultant for over forty years. I worked for PwC for five years before establishing my own consultancy twenty-five years ago. However, given the taint of PwC’s recent behaviour, consulting as a profession has been damaged for at least Continue reading »
The Federal Government has been urged to ignore advice from Private Healthcare Australia (PHA) suggesting that private health insurance funds have an important role in increasing access to dental services. Rather, it is the underfunded and overworked public dental services that have expertise in delivering services to vulnerable people, says health policy analyst Charles Maskell-Knight. Continue reading »
The North Atlantic military alliance has no business in the continent and it should just stop going on about the so-called China threat. As Nato and its boss, Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, keep banging on about “the China threat”, you really have to wonder what the real game plan is. A joint communique by Nato’s Continue reading »
Wait. The Insurrection Act? Where did that come from? Trump did amend that post later to say Espionage Act, but it appears that the Insurrection Act is on his mind. You have to wonder if maybe he’s gotten a target letter from the Special Council. There is good reason for him to worry about that. Jennifer Rubin looked at a new prospective prosecution memo which sees Donald Trump potentially facing some very serious charges based upon the public evidence. One of them is the likelihood of being charged under the Insurrection Act: Building on a prior prosecution memo, a group of seven former prosecutors and defense attorneys — lawyers with decades of collective constitutional and criminal law experience — published at Just Security a voluminous updated memo giving their best estimate (and advice to Smith) as to what to expect. The authors at Just Security consolidated the seven-part conspiracy the House select committee set out into three essential prongs. They explained the first prong: “Trump knew he lost the election but did not want to give up power, so he worked with his lawyers on a wide variety of schemes to change the outcome.
Week-end Wrap – Political Economy – July 16, 2023
by Tony Wikrent
Global power shift
Has the West lost control of oil?
[Unherd, via Naked Capitalism 7-10-2023]
Florida Republicans think so. That’s how batshit insane they are. And Ron DeSantis has empowered them: The Brevard County Republican Executive voted by a supermajority this week to call upon Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis to ban sale and distribution of Covid “and all related vaccines” in the state, Florida Today reported. The nonbinding resolution also demanded that “Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody seize all remaining doses in the state for safety testing, ‘on behalf of the preservation of the human race,’ the resolution states,” the report said. The resolution is part of a trend among GOP county officials in the state, and “closely mirrors” a measure advanced in February in Lee County. Last month a similar resolution was passed in Tampa Bay Hillsborough County, bringing the total to more than half a dozen counties, the outlet reported.
Michigan Republicans go lower I’ve never forgotten the first time I encountered an essay by the late, great Molly Ivins. She described happenins inside the “Austin Funhouse,” a.k.a, the Texas state capitol where, pre-Viagra, overstimulated legislators often went to “fist city.” In Michigan they hit lower, says Michigan Democrats’ state Senate Majority Whip Mallory McMorrow.
Companies know the control they have over workers’ lives. This week, they accidentally admitted it.
Companies know the control they have over workers’ lives. This week, they accidentally admitted it.
Growing turnout where there’s room to grow It’s happened before. The final, low-prestige panels of the Netroots Nation conference — late Saturday afternoon when people are already leaving — turn out to be the most interesting. “You cannot win without the youth vote” featured observations from Voters of Tomorrow panelists: Ahead of the 2022 midterm elections, many national news sources suggested that the youth would not turn out. In reality, the election saw the second-highest youth turnout in the last 30 years. Gen Z voted overwhelmingly for pro-democracy candidates. Without the youth vote, the “red wave” may have become a reality. The Dobbs decision overturning Roe v. Wade was the animating issue in 2022, as well as in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race in 2023. While the youth vote has been increasing, 2022 was the first when over half of Gen Z could vote, the panel agreed. They predict even higher turnout in 2024. Florida Rep. Maxwell Frost, 26, told a ballroom crowd earlier that Democrats must work to make Gen Z’s future a hopeful one of abundance, not retrenchment, if they want their engagement.
A rodent infestation, a leaking washing machine, chipping knives, warm fridges and unstable deep fryers—these are just some of the health and safety issues staff at Glasgow’s the 13th Note have been dealing with in the past six months alone. ‘At the minute, it seems like every time you put down one issue, another two […]
In today's BCTV Daily Dispatch: Babylon 5, The Venture Bros., Justified, Ms. Marvel, Good Omens 2, Doctor Who, SAG-AFTRA/SDCC, and more!
America’s privileged technocrats are not ready for what’s about to happen to them.
The post Today’s Class War Is the 1 Percent Versus the People Just Below Them appeared first on The Intercept.
There is no risk that interest rates on UK government debt will reach crippling levels. Interest rates are policy variables. Paying interest is a political choice. Betteridge’s law of headlines applies.
Use to discuss topics unrelated to recent posts.
It’s Sunday. It’s quiet. I’ll just clear the decks of my philosophy faux-infographics jokes. It’s not just trolleys. Some months back I considered it seriously: “Nietzsche’s key design insight: complex, esoteric ideas, appreciable only by the few — perhaps only by the One! — can be conveyed via simple, conventionalised iconography, suitable for delivering simple, […]
A GM I once worked for was fond of saying “everybody’s got two businesses…their own, and show biz” (usually under his breath after a meeting with one of our advertisers). It would be nice, but it is true that everybody can’t be a “star”…even for those whose only business is show biz. Take actors. This may be a difficult sell to the average working stiff, but not every person who acts for a living commands a 7-figure (or more) salary per-project; they’re living paycheck-to-paycheck like the rest of us. In fact, out of the 160,000 members of the Screen Actors Guild/American Federation of Radio and Television Artists, only around 2% make a living from acting jobs. As you are likely aware, this past Thursday SAG-AFTRA joined the members of the Writers Guild of America on the picket lines (the WGA has been on strike now for several months). The last time this confluence occurred was in 1960. And this time out, the issues at hand are more …complex: SAG-AFTRA and the major studios remain at odds on a dizzying array of issues, as film and TV actors hit the picket lines Friday for the first time since 1980.
