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Reporting a climate of hope and despair for the environment in 2023, Peter Sainsbury has brought us a raft of issues impacting our environment in his weekly report. We share a selection here to round off 2023. Environment: Life scientists endorse civil disobedience Environment: Rapidly closing window of opportunity to achieve a safe, sustainable future Continue reading »

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In Australia, despite the relentless misery conveyed in daily media, we have so much beauty to appreciate, and so much freedom to create more beauty. Our meditation group has a theme this year, focused on beauty. Appreciating and creating beauty is a wonderful theme, yes? At first glance, it seems quite counter-cultural, given the relentless Continue reading »

Where fear of China is involved there is no conscience for the mistakes of the past. Nor can we expect any sensibility in the plans for the future. As we move into the new year, two foreign policy mistakes need to be corrected. First is the idea that Israel needs to be made aware of Continue reading »

What was the advice to Government from officials about the reliability of intelligence on the war? An additional release of Government records on the Iraq War should extend beyond those of Cabinet’s National Security Committee (NSC) of 2003 and be coordinated by Government. The release of NSC records should extend back to the years before Continue reading »

Like so many Australians, I am very worried by our commitment to AUKUS. I agree strongly with many other critics that we have been placed in peril by our government’s submarine agreement with the US and the UK. As John Menadue wrote on 1st April “The AUKUS alliance has forever changed Australia’s sovereignty. Foreign policy Continue reading »

I am currently reading a book by Jeffrey Sachs whose articles often grace these pages. I am struck by the wealth of his experience having advised governments over many years, and his ability to take a long view of world events, in particular the deterioration in the United States position in the world since the Continue reading »

TAFE’s “Competency Based Training” sounds logical but dig a little and its roots are exposed. CBT has its origins in the post WW2 era of the “Scientific Management” of workers and production lines. In this world, products, processes and people are all standardised, the better for a hierarchy of management control.  Apprentices commencing their studies Continue reading »

Projections on Australia’s future are bleak if it maintains it’s hostility to China and cloying dependence on America, particularly when coupled with a corrupt and incompetent LNP government. Tell me, where do you think Australia will be in one, five and twenty years time? Let me speculate. One year from now Covid-19 will still be Continue reading »

The difference between “Asia-Pacific” and “Indo-Pacific” is not just geographical. These are entirely different notions with entirely different economic and geopolitical implications. In 2023, President Xi Jinping was in the United States for a meeting with President Joe Biden and for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Leaders’ meeting in San Francisco. It has been quite a Continue reading »

“Coming for you Pelosi, you socialist c**t!” “We know where you live!” “Antifa’s a bunch of p*ssies!” “If we’re got to hang a bunch of crooked congressmen, we’ll do that, okay?” That’s just a small sample of the patriotic rhetoric heard from these patriots that day. Watch the whole Youtube if you have the stomach for it. It’s about 8 minutes. It’s so easy to forget just how violent these feral criminals were that day. And by the way, Roy Nehls, the congressman attempting to talk to the protesters, wrote this before he voted against certifying the election: Here he is today: Nehls announced Tuesday that he will be serving as a witness for Trump’s defense in the 14th Amendment case that argues the former president should be barred from running for office under the Constitution’s disqualification clause.

We’re just a few weeks away from the 25th anniversary of the Kosovo War, which started in March 1999. So, I’d like to do a retrospective on the war’s causes. This is a long story! It’s going to take at least three posts, and they won’t be short. I think it’s interesting, but it may […]

My problem with Michel Foucault, then, is not that he seeks to “move beyond” the welfare state, but that he actively contributed to its destruction, and that he did so in a way that was entirely in step with the neoliberal critiques of the moment. His objective was not to move towards “socialism,” but to be […]

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Stop pretending he’s wearing clothes! Friday afternoon the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to review the case from Colorado that declared Donald J. Trump, Insurrectionist, ineligible to appear on that state’s 2024 primary ballot. And oh, the humanity! The 14th Amendment, the Civil War, Maine, Colorado, a divided nation, MAGA death threats against lawmakers and judges, etc. Plus the kettles of limp-spaghetti arguments desperate Trump’s attorneys have thrown at courtroom walls hoping something, anything, will stick and save their client’s ass. And then there’s the tarnished Roberts court itself (Washington Post): The public already views the Supreme Court through a partisan lens, with Democrats expressing little confidence in the court and Republicans saying the opposite — and the question of whether Trump should be kept off the ballot has the potential to further polarize those views. “It throws them right into the political thicket,” Stanford law professor Michael W. McConnell said of the court.

With the Doctor Who Christmas Special drawing huge numbers and David Tennant hosting the 2024 BAFTA Awards, the show continues to rule TV.

Plus, a Texas Court throws out a billionaire-backed free speech case, bank tellers organize their industry, and EVs get more accessible.

In today's BCTV Daily Dispatch: Superman and Lois, Pat McAfee/ESPN, Doctor Who, Drag Race, The Orville, Arcane, Peacemaker, and more!

Chinese-made Autel drones, which have been widely used in Ukraine, are shown for sale carrying what appear to be explosive shells.

The post Drones From Company That “Strongly Opposes” Military Use Marketed With Bombs Attached appeared first on The Intercept.

After that, progressives should extirpate the entire Ivy League.

The post Let’s Seize This Opportunity to Destroy Harvard!  appeared first on The Intercept.

Use to discuss topics unrelated to recent posts.