Reading

TOURISM Research Australia (TRA) has released figures for the 2023 and 2024 years, revealing impressive visitor growth for the Coffs Coast. The TRA report shows there were 885,000 domestic overnight visitors per year to Coffs Harbour in the two-year average for 2023-24, a near 20 percent jump on 2022-23. Advertise with News of The Area...

The post Tourism growth for the Coffs Coast appeared first on News Of The Area.

Source - Patreon

Source - Patreon

What a difference an administration can make. On October 9th, 2020, the Former Occupant of the White House issued an official Columbus Day Proclamation, which read in part: Sadly, in recent years, radical activists have sought to undermine Christopher Columbus’s legacy. These extremists seek to replace discussion of his vast contributions with talk of failings, his discoveries with atrocities, and his achievements with transgressions. Rather than learn from our history, this radical ideology and its adherents seek to revise it, deprive it of any splendor, and mark it as inherently sinister. They seek to squash any dissent from their orthodoxy. We must not give in to these tactics or consent to such a bleak view of our history. We must teach future generations about our storied heritage, starting with the protection of monuments to our intrepid heroes like Columbus. This June, I signed an Executive Order to ensure that any person or group destroying or vandalizing a Federal monument, memorial, or statue is prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. I have also taken steps to ensure that we preserve our Nation’s history and promote patriotic education.

Source - Patreon

A GENEROUS $15,000 donation to Coffs Harbour Health Campus’s Colposcopy Clinic from the Pink Silks Perpetual Trust has enabled the purchase of specialised equipment to enhance the clinic’s gynaecology services. The donation underscores the ongoing commitment of the local charity to provide practical support to women’s health in the Coffs Coast community. Advertise with News...

The post Pink Silks Trust saving lives with $15,000 donation appeared first on News Of The Area.

Doctor Who's Russell T. Davies updated The War Between the Land and the Sea and teased someone set for the final scene of the final episode.

Steelmanning (as opposed to strawmannin) is a rather obscure concept defined as: A steel man argument (or steelmanning) is the opposite of a straw man argument. Steelmanning is the practice of applying the rhetorical principle of charity through addressing the strongest form of the other person’s argument, even if it is not the one they explicitly presented. Creating the strongest form of the opponent’s argument may involve removing flawed assumptions that could be easily refuted or developing the strongest points which counter one’s own position. Developing counters to steel man arguments may produce a stronger argument for one’s own position Apparently, the Washington Post called up economics journalist Noah Smith and asked him to make the best case for Trump’s economic policies, ostensibly in order to give people a good faith argument that they could easily understand so they’d realize that Trump’s policies aren’t actually very good. Steelmanning. Smith declined because while there may be some reasonable uses for this type of argumentation.

Don’t tell me that’s hyperbole: And who is the man in charge of this operation? I think Trump using the “Aliens Enemies Act of 1798” on the stump is new but I might be wrong. I’m sure he loves the sound of it. If you’d like refresher on this odious archaic law, the Brennan Center has a good one.

The leader of Australia’s Opposition, Peter Dutton, is aligning himself with a proposition about good and evil, civilisation and tyranny, that can only lead to the perpetuation of violence and the glorification of war, not its diminishment. The position of both men is dishonest, self-deluding and dangerous. Peter Dutton’s agreement with Benjamin Netanyahu that Israel Continue reading »

Over the years I’ve learnt to chew and walk at the same time. It’s taken a while, but I think I’ve mastered it. Being able and willing to condemn the actions of Hamas, and criticising Iran while also condemning the callousness of Israel’s incursions into Gaza, the West Bank and now Lebanon is something I Continue reading »

Continue reading »

Australia, land of Altjira, of oceans wild and skies untamed, Where stories of the Jukurrpa are told in songlines proclaimed. Australia, land of Altjira, of oceans wild and skies untamed, Where stories of the Jukurrpa are told in songlines proclaimed. Yet underneath this broad expanse, this dust that shrouds our past in gold, Lies history’s Continue reading »

He wants people to think he’s a superman: That’s no doubt true. “I may be a criminal, a fascist and an all-around disgraceful human being but I’m leading in the polls, so vote for me!” does sound like Trump. I also think he just believes that he can make reality conform to his desires. And for millions of his cult members, he can. But there’s an actual, longstanding campaign strategy involved as well. I wrote about it back in 2022 just before that election: One more day until the voting is done. Hallelujah! When the polls are so tight and the campaigning so intense you reach a point where you almost don’t care who wins anymore and just want it to be over. But of course you do care, as we all must in this age of authoritarian right-wing, lunacy. I wrote on Friday that nobody really knows anything about this election. It could go either way. It might be a close result or one side could sweep both houses of Congress with big wins. But if you just read the headlines and listen to the pundits and strategists on TV, you’d think the evidence showed clearly that Republicans were running away with it.

The alleged billionaire feels poor: Donald J. Trump took his seat at the dining table in his triplex penthouse apartment atop Trump Tower on the last Sunday in September, alongside some of the most sought-after and wealthiest figures in the Republican Party. There was Paul Singer, the billionaire hedge fund manager who finances Republican campaigns and pro-Israel causes, and Warren Stephens, the billionaire investment banker. Joining them were Betsy DeVos, the billionaire former education secretary under Mr. Trump, and her husband, Dick, as well as the billionaire Joe Ricketts and his son Todd. Some politicians might have taken the moment to be charming and ingratiating with the donors. Not Mr. Trump. Over steak and baked potatoes, the former president tore through a bitter list of grievances.He made it clear that people, including donors, needed to do more, appreciate him more and help him more. He disparaged Vice President Kamala Harris as “retarded.” He complained about the number of Jews still backing Ms. Harris, saying they needed their heads examined for not supporting him despite everything he had done for the state of Israel. At one point, Mr.

Rumors and their origins Northeast of here, near the the little town of Spruce Pine, NC, there is a mine that provides key minerals used in the manufacture of microelectronics (NPR): Semiconductors are the brains of every computer-chip-enabled device, and solar panels are a key part of the global push to combat climate change. To make both semiconductors and solar panels, companies need crucibles and other equipment that both can withstand extraordinarily high heat and be kept absolutely clean. One material fits the bill: quartz. Pure quartz. Quartz that comes, overwhelmingly, from Spruce Pine. “As far as we know, there’s only a few places in the world that have ultra-high-quality quartz,” according to Ed Conway, author of Material World: The Six Raw Materials That Shape Modern Civilization. Russia and Brazil also supply high-quality quartz, he says, but “Spruce Pine has far and away the [largest amount] and highest quality.” Conway says without super-pure quartz for the crucibles, which can often be used only a single time, it would be impossible to produce most semiconductors.

Regulators get the lead out, the Golden State sheds light on dark money, mercury and methane get the boot, and Google has a very bad week.

What else is new? New reveleations yesterday from Bob Woodward’s forthcoming book, “War,” out just in time for the fall of the American empire. An MSNBC pundit last night wryly observed that the first two outlets to report it are based in England (that is, beyond Donald Trump’s immediate reach should he win a second term next month), The Independent and the Guardian. The Independent first: Mark Milley, the US Army general who Donald Trump appointed as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, now says the current Republican presidential nominee is a “fascist to the core” and says no person has ever posed more of a danger to the United States than the man who served as the 45th President of the United States. In perhaps an unprecedented (time to retire that term?) move, a chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff asked to meet with the new U.S. attorney general. Milley urged Merrick Garland post-Jan. 6 to investigate domestic extremists and far-right militias.

Seems Ncuti Gatwa's reported announcement about Doctor Who Season 3 filming in 2025 was cut from The Graham Norton Show. What does it mean?

I förra veckans avsnitt av Starta Pressarna  fortsätter debatten om Riksbankens självständighet och hur vi hittar rätt balans mellan finans- och penningpolitik.  Medverkande i det här avsnittet är — förutom Daniel Suhonen och Max Jerneck — Per Molander och Lars Calmfors. En intressant och initierad diskussion — men när det gäller frågan om Riksbankens självständighet […]