Posts Tagged ‘Politics’
Saturday, March 6th, 2010
Phillip Adams; 6/3/10
HQ for the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party was the Kremlin. HQ for the Central Committee of the US Republican Party is the Supreme Court. As hostile to the democratic process as their counterparts in Moscow who ruled with hammer and sickle, the heavies in Washington DC rule, and overrule, with iron fist and gavel. Ignoring precedent and the cautions of the founding fathers expressed in an increasingly dilapidated constitution, the bloc of judges appointed by conservative presidents are rendering some appalling decisions. Such is the gratitude of these judges appointed by conservative presidents that they, in turn, appoint conservative presidents. The first was George W. Bush. Ignoring electoral chicanery in Florida – and America’s popular vote – the Supreme Court put Gore’s head on a pike and handed the oval office to the Republicans on a platter. Now other Republican candidates will be guaranteed an armchair ride to the oval office and their second-term prospects immensely improved. All because of a Supreme Court decision that Obama understates as “devastating”.
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Tags: Politics, USA
Posted in USA, War | No Comments »
Friday, February 12th, 2010
Nick McKenzie & Rafael Epstein; 12/2/10
A senior Australian Army media adviser who served in Afghanistan and Iraq has revealed that a culture of excessive spin and unnecessary secrecy stopped important information reaching the public. Andrew Bird, who left the army in December after eight years as an information operations and media adviser, said Defence obscured or painted an overly rosy picture of war in places such as Afghanistan. ”The way that we communicated is all government-centric. It just relayed the ministers’ and prime minister’s message, reinforcing the government’s message. Every image we took, every interview we did and every bit of vision … was to support the government’s view,” he told The Age. A Defence spokesman rejected the claims. Mr Bird, who reached the rank of major, said the army often stage-managed events for the media, blurred the truth in interviews or used the excuse information was operationally sensitive to avoid giving it out.
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Tags: Australia, Military, Politics, USA
Posted in Arms, Australia, USA | No Comments »
Thursday, October 22nd, 2009
Avi Issacharoff; 22/10/09; (2 Items)
The Obama administration’s ambassador to the United Nations told Israelis on Wednesday that it is not enough just to pay lip service to peace and urged the government to immediately relaunch negotiations, without preconditions, aimed at creating an independent Palestinian state. Ambassador Susan Rice, in an address at a high-powered conference hosted by Israeli President Shimon Peres, assured Israelis – many of whom are wary of U.S. President Barack Obama’s Mideast agenda – that her government is committed to their security. “As President Peres always reminds us, being serious about peace means taking risks for peace,” Rice said. “Being serious about peace means understanding that tomorrow need not look like yesterday.”
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Tags: Israel, Politics, Terrorism, USA
Posted in Israel & Palestine, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Friday, July 24th, 2009
Jeff Gates; 24/7/09
In the early 1960s, Sen. William J. Fulbright fought to force the American Zionist Council to register as agents of a foreign government. The council eluded registration by reorganizing as the American Israel Public Affairs Committee. AIPAC has since become what Fulbright most feared: A foreign agent dominating American foreign policy while disguised as a domestic lobby. Israelis and pro-Israelis object when they hear that charge. How, they ask, can we so few wield such influence over so many? Answer: It’s all in the math. And in the single-issue advocacy brought to bear on US policy-making by dozens of “domestic” organizations that now compose the Israel lobby, with AIPAC its most visible force. The political math was enabled by Sen. John McCain whose support for all things Israeli ensured him the GOP nomination to succeed George W. Bush. McCain’s style of campaign finance reform proved a perfect fit for the Diaspora-based fundraising on which the lobby relies. Co-sponsored by Sen. Russ Feingold of Wisconsin, this change in federal election law typifies how Israeli influence became systemic.
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Tags: Israel, Politics, USA
Posted in Israel & Palestine, USA | No Comments »
Tuesday, June 16th, 2009
John Warhurst; 16/6/09
John Warhurst is an Adjunct Professor of Political Science at the Australian National University and Flinders University of South Australia and a Canberra Times columnist. He was named an Officer in the Order of Australia on the 2009 Queen’s Birthday honours list.
The listing of Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull in the Business Review Weekly among Australia’s richest 200 people with $178 million caused a passing political stir. Despite the fallback position that Therese Rein’s wealth is measured at $50 million, Turnbull, the Member for Net Worth (not Wentworth) according to BRW, still does not appear to be comfortable discussing the subject. He could retort that in politics, economic success in life should be a plus rather than a minus. Senator Bill Heffernan took this line when he hijacked Laurie Oakes’ interview with Turnbull, accusing Oakes of running a ‘bullshit’ line of questioning. Heffernan has a point. In our community, however, a suspicion of extreme wealth remains, whether we call it envy or the tall poppy syndrome.
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Tags: Australia, Politics, Wealth
Posted in Aid / Trade, Australia, Human Rights | No Comments »
Sunday, June 29th, 2008
Paul Daley; 29/6/08
There’s a weary saying among some top brass at Australia’s Defence headquarters at Canberra’s Russell Hill: “Defence ministers come and go. But we are here to stay.” What they actually mean is: “Defence ministers think they run us. But we run them.” … Fast forward and enter Joel Fitzgibbon, a no-bullshit former auto-electrician from Cessnock in country NSW. … Soon after being sworn in as Defence Minister, Fitzgibbon dressed down one stunned service chief when answers he demanded about the deaths of personnel were not forthcoming. The same (now former) chief got another serve when a multibillion-dollar procurement went off the rails and he couldn’t be contacted. He was on the golf course. His mobile wasn’t. Then, just before Christmas in a closed-door meeting of NATO defence ministers in the shadows of Edinburgh Castle, Fitzgibbon let fly at the organisation’s lack of coherence on Afghanistan.
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Tags: Australia, Military, Politics
Posted in Arms, Australia | No Comments »
Tuesday, June 17th, 2008
Editorial; 16/6/08
The US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is making her sixth trip this year to Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories in a bid to revive – or more accurately pretend to revive – peace talks. Having been asked about the Jewish state’s latest announcement of building and expanding some of its illegal colonies on occupied land, Rice referred to it as a “problem”. Could she not have been more blunt and called Israel’s actions illegal? Even though the rest of the world has long agreed that any construction or expansion of Israeli colonies on Palestinian land is illegal, Israel has managed not only to secure American oversight but also the US’ overall support, except perhaps for former president George Bush Sr, on this issue.
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Tags: Israel, Politics, USA
Posted in Human Rights, Israel & Palestine, Terrorism, USA | No Comments »
Friday, May 9th, 2008
Ashleigh Wilson; 8/5/08
A Sydney councillor has criticised a playground sculpture for featuring an extract from Paul Keating’s Redfern speech, claiming the words were a “real guilt trip” to non-indigenous Australians who had already apologised to the Stolen Generations. Shayne Mallard, a Liberal member of the Sydney City Council, last night said the former prime minister’s message was inappropriate for a children’s playground. “This is political correctness going mad when you put this in the playground,” Mr Mallard said. “What happened to the age of innocence?” The sculpture, by indigenous artist Fiona Foley, includes several lines from Mr Keating’s acclaimed speech in the Sydney suburb of Redfern in 1992.
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Tags: Aboriginal, Australia, Politics
Posted in Aboriginal, Australia | No Comments »
Friday, May 9th, 2008
Paul Toohey; 8/5/08
Northern Territory Deputy Chief Minister Marion Scrymgour has reached across the top of Australia to give a sharp touch-up to the man she called “Saint Noel” and a “latter-day Martin Luther” – better known as Cape York Institute’s Noel Pearson. In a speech to parliament in Darwin, Ms Scrymgour doubted north Queensland’s Mr Pearson was any kind of visionary and described his views as “unremarkable”. She hit bombastic stride by likening the challenges of her Government to those faced by Franklin Delano Roosevelt when he entered the White House in the Great Depression.
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Tags: Aboriginal, Australia, Politics
Posted in Aboriginal, Australia | No Comments »
Monday, April 28th, 2008
Editorial; 28/4/08
Aborigines are part of the urban underclass InN an exclusive post-2020 Summit interview with The Australian last week, Indigenous Affairs Minister Jenny Macklin had her priorities right. While willing to consider calls for a treaty between black and white Australia, the Rudd Government’s “No1 focus” will remain closing the 17-year gap between indigenous and non-indigenous life expectancy. Breaching the large gap in education standards between black and white Australia and reducing indigenous childhood mortality are top priorities. We applaud her good sense. On the question of a treaty, two of the nation’s most credible Aboriginal leaders were even more blunt. Cape York leader Noel Pearson and Arnhem Land powerbroker Galarrwuy Yunupingu branded the treaty push as a political “dead horse”. Instead, they want their fellow indigenous leaders to embrace the mainstream push towards constitutional recognition of Aboriginal people. But the symbolic importance of a constitutional preamble, they warned, should not come at the expense of practical measures to combat endemic Aboriginal disadvantage. Born of long experience and frustration, this is sage advice.
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Tags: Aboriginal, Australia, Health & Welfare, Politics
Posted in Aboriginal, Australia, Health & Children, Human Rights, Racism | No Comments »
Sunday, February 10th, 2008
Michael Bachelard; 10/2/08
The Prime Minister, John Howard, has warned his MPs not to accept help from the Exclusive Brethren, and Kevin Rudd has refused their requests to meet him. Revelations of the religious sect’s covert political activism, the funding of their schools and attempts to influence the Family Court have made the Brethren political poison. Sources have said that the Mr Howard’s message filtered out via NSW Senator Bill Heffernan that MPs were not to accept help or donations from the group, as public suspicion of their influence on politics grows. Neither Mr Howard nor Senator Heffernan responded to queries yesterday.
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Tags: Australia, Cults, Politics
Posted in Aid / Trade, Australia, Religion | No Comments »
