The rights of the people

I have a question in light of the actions of people like Julian Assange and Snowden. I don’t know the ins and outs of their actions and it would seem to me that the true impact of their actions is not yet known apart from the obvious damage it is doing to the US ego but as far as lives put in danger that claim remains debatable by some.
My question is: If whistle-blowers become afraid of speaking up for fear of prosecution and if media become afraid to report the truth for fear of prosecution and the authorities that uphold the law are so close to the law makes that they are prevented from acting on doubtful behaviour, when the law makers themselves are part of the deception to operate covertly and it turns out the government authorised the deception - who is going to hold governments accountable for such betrayal of the people?
I hear you all say loud and clear WE the people will when called on to vote at an election. The problem is how will we know what is going on if the whistle-blowers become afraid of speaking up for fear of prosecution and if the media is afraid to report for fear of prosecution and the authorities that uphold the law are so close to the law makes that they are prevented from acting on questionable behaviour, when the law makers are part of the deception to operate covertly in the first place as it turns out the government authorised the deception?
If the whistle-blowers that exposed the systematic torture of prisoners by the US and its allies (directly and indirectly by sending people to second and third party counties) hadn't done what they did it would still be going on?  You bet it would because we wouldn't know about it.
This post is not in support or otherwise of the US, Assange or Snowden. I simply pose the question as I see a big problem.

Climate wars.

I have another rant on climate change (sorry) after seeing this article in the SMH
http://www.smh.com.au/executive-style/culture/blogs/all-men-are-liars/climate-wars-20130612-2o3fg.html

My Prediction.
As the climate changes vast areas that are currently arid will be transformed into arable useful land. Just as the Sahara desert was once a fertile land of plants and animals so it will be again and just as Antarctica was once covered in vegetation so it will be again.
Land that once stood above sea level will be no more just like the land bridges that once existed across The Bering Straits and down through Asia once existed and towns that once stood along coastlines around the Mediterranean now lie beneath the waves. Fertile parts of continents like America and Europe will become desolate while other continents will become fertile and rich. There will be extinctions just like the extinction of the Mammoth 10,000 years ago while other species will rise and dominate just like mammals over dinosaurs. Poor countries will become powerful and powerful countries will become poor as new areas are opened up for development. There will be mass displacement and migration of people just like our ancestors as they migrated across the globe following the seasons and food tens of thousands of years ago.
And how do I know all this? Because that has been our earth’s history of climate change it’s been going on for millions of years and it continues to this day, it is proven scientific fact. Are we contributing to it to some level? Possibly just like our ancestors probably did as well, but the myth of humans being able to stop it is the real danger in my opinion. We divert billions of dollars into climate change projects while people die around us. Money that could be used to feed millions of starving humans and provide clean drinking water right now are diverted into meaningless projects. What justification is there for such policy? Save the world for future generations, while we let millions of this current generation die? Sacrifice the few for the many, is that it? Is that the world you want to live?
Or will the true outcome of the policy of climate change be far more sinister than that (deliberate of otherwise) - maintain the status quo? Rich and developed countries remain rich and developing and the poor remain poor and undeveloped? The countries that have had the benefit of growing their economies unfettered by climate change policy now dictate that policy and inflicted that policy on those countries that now seek to grow. Is it right that these third world countries must take the responsibility and pay the price for the developed world? Will this be the end result of our climate change policies in the long run?
As I said in the beginning our climate has changed dramatically in the past and it will again. Our climate change policy is like trying to stop a tornado by getting everyone to pay a fee (tax) to stand in a line as it bears on them and blow in the opposite direction in the hope that the insignificant waft we produce will change its direction while the guy who came up with the idea hides in a shelter and uses the money to advertise to get more people to help.

Justice for the people

I can't help but comment on 2 high profile murder cases that have taken place in Australia over the past 12 months given some of the reports I have seen today. The first is the Thomas Kelly case and the downgrading of his murder charge and the second is the Jill Meagher case in Victoria.
I can only imagine that in the Thomas Kelly case and the downgrading of his charge to manslaughter that the prosecution have taken this option as they feel certain of a manslaughter conviction without a retrial if a murder conviction failed. The problem for the prosecution is that they will have to prove beyond doubt that he intended to kill Kelly. Given that Kelly’s actual death was because his head hit the ground and not due to the punch they probably feel that a jury would not find him guilty of willful premeditated murder. While I understand that if Kelly had not been hit his head would not have hit the ground the prosecution still have to prove that the perpetrator wanted to kill his target. Given the accused man had assaulted 3 or 4 others that night and none of them were seriously injured probably helped convince the prosecutors that they would be better served with a guilty plea of manslaughter rather than pushing for a murder conviction and fail. What will be interesting is to see what criminal history the accused has. As in the Jill Meagher case if it turns out the assailant has a long serious criminal record of assaults and should not have been on the street in the first place then the DPP could look at appealing any manslaughter conviction if it can.

This brings me to the Jill Meagher case and our parole laws and repeat violent offenders. The problem for our justice system is that they cannot really know what is going on in the human mind. Bayley (Meagher’s confessed murderer) himself has admitted that he lied about his “rehabilitation” to get parole and the parole board that assessed him to be fit for parole agreed when in fact he was not fit. In this case we are dealing with a psychopath and a psychopath is not a normal human condition. Psychopaths are not bound by normal social conventions or normal human reasoning or behaviour for that matter and so should be treated accordingly in the Justice system in my opinion.
There is no real rehabilitation option for people like Bayley because he himself is not bound by normal human constraints. The problem is that in this day and age we have been convinced by the "bleeding heart do gooder's" that we can help these criminals and that we have a responsibility to help them and if we don’t try rehabilitation to help them we are no better than the people we lock away. I come back to my first point we can never really fully understand or know what is going on in the mind of a psychopath like Bayley. The fact is he and criminals like him use our desire to help to gain parole and as with Bayley just so they can re-offend. How many chances to re-offend must a psychopath like Bayley be given with each crime escalating over time? Our responsibility in fact should be to the safety of law abiding people as well as the criminals we incarcerate. He was already in the one place fitting for such a person, safely locked away from reach of his deranged fantasy world in a place where we would have been protected from him and he would have been protected from himself surely that is the responsibility of our justice system. The question we must ask ourselves in the Thomas Kelly case is do we have another Bayley in our care and how many chances do we give him?

Great news for Ford workers bad news for the rest of us.

Great news for ford workers- We will look after Ford workers, says Swan.
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/we-will-look-after-ford-workers-says-swan-20130523-2k26p.html#ixzz2U4Z31JMB
http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/we-will-look-after-ford-workers-says-swan-20130523-2k26p.html

Oh sure! Just like they helped the Bluescope Steel workers in the Illawarra? A Labor government that should be supporting jobs in Australia is becoming the worst representative of the Australian worker. They have stuffed it up so badly. They have stuffed up the mining tax, the carbon tax, border security with our international neighbours and spent all of our financial reserves on crap from the education revolution to roof insulation to "save us" from the GFC. And don’t even start me on the list of current and former Labor party members who are facing charges or are under investigation for corruption after feathering their own nests while Australian jobs go down the drain and we the Australian people have to tighten our belts with tax cuts. This is nothing short of a betrayal of the Australian people. Have a look at this story on the ABC about how Labor are helping out Australian workers. (Cut and paste this link to the ABC) -http://www.abc.net.au/7.30/content/2013/s3764355.htm

Holden, Bluescope now Ford and I am sure my friends in other states could list others. Who next before we can get them out of office? We are watching the slow death of manufacturing in Australia under the guidance of Gillard and Swan and the Australian labor party. Take a look at the ABC story and if the initiatives they are giving the Bluescope workers are any indication of their "help" they would be better to just give the money to the poor workers who need it. It’s another roofing insulation debacle all over again. You know what gets my goat more than anything? It is the utter hypocrisy of the unions who are supposed to stand up for Australian workers. If it was a liberal government in power unions around Australia would have united in support of the Australian worker and be up in arms but what do we hear from them? Nothing! With an election coming up they would be running advertising campaigns on TV against the incumbent government (as we have seen from them before) but what do we see? Nothing, not a word! You could only conclude by their silence that they are not interested in the Australian worker at all and the way this government treats us and it all meets with their approval. Their own silence condemns them to the irrelevant institution they have become.

What is racist?

Sorry I am a little late on this topic but I was off the air this week. There has been a lot of discussion on FB in regard to the Adam Goodes incident last week and I thought I would offer my own analysis from my point of view about it. From the outset let me say that Goodes is a great sportsman and could be considered a role model to ALL sport loving Australians (even if it is AFL) but to me this feels like a real media beat up, hell I don’t even think the original comment from the girl was racist anyway and if that is the worst thing Goodes has been called I would be surprised. That in no way excuses the girl’s poor behaviour but for god’s sake she is a 13 year old girl.
In my opinion Australia is in danger of losing its sense of perspective on this issue thanks to the media portraying Australia as a county full of racists. It seems to me that racism is very selective for the media who have pushed this story hard this week but has double standards on it. As a result of this lopsided media beat-up some people may come to the conclusion that they are in fact different and expect the rest of us to treat them differently from everyone else and this may in fact already be happening.

As someone who has travelled around the world a bit it’s my opinion that Australia as a country is not a racist country by any stretch of the imagination, there are certainly racists among us that’s true but as a whole the laws of this country allow anybody to come to this country and make a go of it no matter their background and they are equal under the law. That however can’t be said for many other countries. Try and buy a home or land in some of our Asian neighbour’s countries or get citizenship they actually have laws against it to stop you. Try and practise religious freedom in any Islamic country, on the whole nobody can say Australia is not a tolerant country by comparison.

There was actually an example on TV recently of this double standard from the media on this topic with a Scotsman selling a new Ute in an ad, you may have seen it. In the ad he tells us that we should trust a Scotsman when looking for a deal on a new Ute. What are they suggesting to us, that Scottish people are penny-pinchers and tight with their money? Let me give you an alternative for that ad that you will never see. Imagine if the Scotsman was replaced by a Jew in the same ad. I can tell you now the ad would never see the light of day and if it did it would be a news story. Why? It’s just a joke right? Why is it not offensive for a Scotsman to be in the ad but we would all feel that the ad was a little off if he told us he was a Jew and we should trust him to find a great deal the inference being that Jews are also tight with their money. I can’t help feeling that there are different standards of racism from a media who beat us up over the issue on one hand but are happy to use a Scottish person and the inference that it carries to sell a Ute but would probably never use a Jewish person to do the same job. We are being played on this issue by the media in my opinion and the real issues of addressing racism are not being helped by this sort of fake indignation from the media for the sake of ratings. Anyway that’s what I think and I may well be wrong but that’s just how this whole story for the last week has felt to me just a big media game.

Why we must move on from Rudd.

I can’t help but comment on the actions of Kevin Rudd over the last week and the reaction from some of the public.

The thing I don’t understand is why people are so taken in by this guy. Don’t misunderstand me I do get that there is a level of sympathy for him and the way he was treated by his own party when removed (inappropriately in my opinion) from the Prime Ministership. That said however I think people should remember the circumstances surrounding that event and how it came about. I think we have forgotten just what the circumstances were that led to his removal at the time. The picture back then was of a party losing its grip with a Nielsen poll in May 2010 indicating that if an election were held then, Labor would lose that election. All this came on the back of the disastrous roofing insulation debacle and failed climate change policy back flips and increased spending during the GFC. It is also important to remember that at that time he was ably advised by the likes of Gillard, Swan and Wong. Rudd also had come under increased criticism from those around him of his autocratic leadership style that was creating difficulty within his own office among his staff. In July 2010 Bob Hawk said of Rudd on the 7:30 Report “Mr Rudd could have been prime minister for a lot longer if he had taken a different approach”. Hawk also said “I also had the feeling that he would have avoided it all if he had been consultative". So at the time Rudd had created mistrust in the voting public and polls were on the way down with an even greater dislike among his cabinet, party colleagues and staff. There was certainly a collective “gasp” however from the public with his removal and a feeling that this was not the right way to treat a sitting prime minister and that he should have been allowed to see out his term and let the public decide his fate. It is this that I believe has created this “soft spot’ for Rudd today.  

However the conduct of Rudd since that time could not be described as dignified or prime ministerial. Rudd has conducted a subversive counter attack that has been a constant destabilising factor to the current government. He and his supporters have made every attempt to bring Gillard down and undermine her position as well as public confidence in her ability. Earlier this week on ABC Q&A Mark Latham, who knows a little about the savagery of labor politics accusing Rudd of being ‘‘evil’’ and “orchestrating a three-year ‘‘jihad of revenge’’ which he said was “unprecedented in Australian politics”. Latham said "You’re getting into the realm of evil here with Rudd, the realm of evil, with someone who has gone well beyond normal practices in politics...’’

As it looks at this time Gillard and her government, (again ably assisted the same people that were supporting Rudd - Swan and Wong) will fall victim of its own ineptitude in September but I am also sure there will also be a bit of pay back from the public for the wrongs done to Rudd.

This brings me to bit about Rudd and the fawning fans I saw on TV this week that I don’t understand. What has been Rudd’s motivation since his removal in 2010? Has it been to work hard to see the stability, prosperity and growth of the Australian economy for the benefit of the Australian people? Has it been to fight for Australian’s around the country that have lost their jobs and face significant financial hardship under this government? Has it been to see a resolution to the asylum seeker and border security issues facing this country? Or has it been to seek revenge, destabilise and unseat Gillard and her supporters? Based on Rudd’s actions since 2010 Latham may well be right when he described Rudd as a "once-in-a-century egomaniac". Based on the evidence you would have to say Rudd falls into the second category in my opinion. I don’t know about you but I am not sure this qualifies him for the job of prime minister of this country. I for one don’t think we need a leader that has displayed nothing but self-promotion, self-interest, contempt and revenge regardless of the impact those actions would ultimately have on the rest of us. Rudd should be consigned to history as the failed leader that he was and let’s move on.

A town like Bourke.

I could not help but feel sadness as I read through an article in the Sydney Morning Herald today: Crying out for a new beginning.

http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/crying-out-for-a-new-beginning-20130201-2dq00.html

For a few years in the 90s I worked for the NSW state government and part of my patch was working in the Bourke area. I must admit that on my first trip out there I arrived with some trepidation. I had heard the stories of a dysfunctional town, high crime rates and zealous police.

What I found however was not quite what I was expecting. Yes I saw the poverty of some of the local indigenous people. I heard the stories from both sides of rough justice meted out by some of the local police. What I also found was a town that felt like an island oasis, a town made up of proud individuals who deep down loved this place black and white, this island in the middle of the bush. I also found a town not only overwhelmingly rich in aboriginal history but a place that is so burnt into the Australian psyche that much of Australia’s grounding and sense of mateship was born here. Names like Banjo Paterson, Henry Lawson and Breaker Morant helped put Bourke on the map and build an image of outback Australia, hell they even have a festival celebrating it.

What I also found was sadness a sadness in the people and a sadness in the local indigenous people. As I got to know some of them over time I began to get a sense of the people and how much they loved this place. I found many good people who just wanted a fair go from a town that was almost responsible for creating the concept. What I also felt was a people who had been so neglected by their own leaders that they had nowhere to turn. Feeling no part of the white man‘s world the one place you would think they could find refuge was among their own but it could not be found. 

I still remember my first tour around the town with a local council representative driving past houses that were no more than shacks. I remember we turned down what my tour guide referred to as Crystal St, not that there is a Crystal street in Bourke that I know of, that was the name he gave it due to the amount of broken glass built up over the years that covered the road reflecting the sun’s rays in the late afternoon. In my naivety I asked what was being done to help not realising that I was looking at the help around me in the broken buildings they called homes. As I read this story today I found it hard to comprehend that nothing could have changed since then.

It has been some years now since an apology was made to indigenous Australians of the stolen generation on our behalf. An apology that was given to help heal the wounds of the past caused by the government of the day when they forcibly removed children from parents, an action considered necessary for the protection of some Aboriginal Australians yet it caused so much pain and suffering for so many.
So how has the apology helped the people of Bourke? Has it made the issues that face local aboriginal Australians any better? Has it really allowed people to move on? As I read though the story I could not help but think that there was something missing for these people, something more that was needed before they are able to move forward.

If the apology was considered necessary from our government for past deeds committed against aboriginal people I can’t help but feel that what is missing is an apology from their own Aboriginal leaders for the systematic abuse by previous indigenous organisations, individuals and leadership? Abuse that was going on as Kevin Rudd spoke the very words of apology and as suggested in this article still obvious in Bourke today. It is well documented and acknowledged that governments have got it wrong and carry much responsibility with numerous inquires pointing out the failures. But what of the failures of aboriginal leadership and organisations that have let their own people down?

There are many examples that have come to light over the years of federal and state funds squandered on projects that brought little or no benefit to people that were in need by their very own people . There are countless examples of some Aboriginal leadership who were abusing the very communities they served, and there are examples of leadership who not only knew of financial abuse, neglect even sexual exploitation including assaults on women and paedophilia but did nothing and I am not suggesting that has taken place in Bourke I have no evidence of that. But who from current Aboriginal leadership will stand up and apologise for past neglect and abuse of their own people? If it was necessary for our government to take responsibility for the misguided deeds of the past should it not be necessary for Aboriginal leadership to take responsibility for their own misdeeds?

Sorrow and forgiveness from within a family can be a powerful thing. Following a dispute with a loved one the admission of wrong and a full and unconditional apology can bring profound healing to that family, was that not the intended result of an official apology by the federal government to assist in that process? An expression of sorrow can invoke a strong and binding family relationship that allows that family to heal, forgive and move forward. Surely it is this very healing and forgiveness that is needed now in Bourke. The healing process may have begun with Kevin Rudd. We as a nation can now look back and admit that things should have been done differently. Healing for indigenous Australia also needs to come from within as an expression of sorrow giving people the opportunity to move forward. Until that time I cannot see how Bourke can move forward as my impression is that they feel they can’t trust anyone not even their own leadership. Where are they going to turn and how do they move forward?