Current topical links (available to all readers):
[Links to the MAI]
[Queensland
One Nation State Election website]
[Sign the "I'm so sorry Pauline"
book]
Archive of weekly features (available to all readers):
[The
Canberra Column]
[Economic
Rationalism]
Today's
Headlines
an Aussie's viewpoint on Australia's
first daily Internet newspaper.
Since
October 1995
International:
The MAI under fire from all quarters
Yesterday we covered the Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Lateline
report on the MAI.
Maxine McKeogh
said that Sir Anthony Mason's comments as well as those of Pauline
Hanson had stimulated the interest on covering this proposed international
treaty. What is of particular interest is that the News Limited Courier Mail
have selectively refused to cover this major international treaty despite
the high profile now being given the issue by leading citizens including
Sir Anthony Mason, Former Chief Justice of the High Court, at the opening
of the Melbourne Convention on Monday.
Extract from speech
by Sir Anthony Mason, transcript in full here:
"If the prophets of the demise of the nation state
be right, we should be thinking about making international decision making
itself more democratic, open and transparent.....
"The problems are considerable. Take the current
negotiation in OECD over the Multilateral Agreement on Investment, an agreement
which could have a great impact on Australia if we ratify it. The negotiation,
so far as Australia is concerned, is in the hands of Treasury. The negotiation
is not an open process; it is being conducted in secret. There are no
doubt reasons which can be advanced to support the veil of secrecy. But at
the end of the day it is possible that the terms will be set in concrete
leaving Australia with very limited choices to make, the effective choices
having been made by Treasury and Federal Cabinet during the course of the
unpublished negotiations."
It goes without saying that Rupert Murdoch and Kerry Packer will be major
beneficiaries of the MAI if Australia sign it as, once the proposed
media ownership exemptions are rolled over after a period of time, it will
be open slather in Australia. If there is a valid conspiracy theory behind
the formulation of the MAI then they are, without doubt, part of it
by trying to keep this treaty under wraps, out of sight, where the average
Aussie is not aware of its impact on their lives or those of their children.
The ABC Lateline
programme is now fully transcribed and available here.
The ABC showed a programme on the piranha fish in South America last
night... it made me think of the feeding frenzy that we would face here once
these media ownership laws were rolled over. There would be blood on the
streets... the blood of small independent media proprietors being rolled
by the media moguls.
An example of how the market is being captured and bled dry is going on right
now under the eyes of Queenslanders. Since inception the Courier Mail
has not carried a special classified lift out. A hole in the market which
has been filled for many years by small trading post papers which come out
every two weeks. In Queensland we have the "Trading Post" and
"Queensland Trading Post" who employ over 100 people between them.
These specialist papers are sold for a dollar in South East Queensland and
are part of a tradition of how second hand goods are bought and sold... The
Queensland Trading Post have an on-line version called
Ads-On-Line. An excellent
service which I use on a regular basis. (In fact I can tell you that I
sourced Pauline Hanson's internet PC through this service).
The Courier Mail, to capture the market that these two players share,
now offer free advertisements for goods up to Au$100 and a maximum of Au$10
for any other classifieds placed with them... of course their new specialist
classified lift out comes out weekly as well.
The end result will be a loss of over 100 jobs in Brisbane, the closure of
two small businesses in the city and the News Limited empire expanding
its cancerous feelers just a little bit more... this has all happened before,
many, many times.
One of our readers informs us that he used to run viable independent free
papers at Mt Isa. When he refused to sell out to News Limited as the
media giant wanted to take over that region's market they simply started
issuing defamation orders against the editor of the paper. At first they
were intimidated and unsure what to do... then they tackled the problem head
on - publishing, in full, copies of the intimidatory News Limited defamation
orders in their paper. Surprise, surprise the ruse worked and the defamation
orders stopped coming but News Limited, by using its media might,
still captured the Mt Isa market.
Classic comment from India's new government - the
BJP.
When speaking on their philosophy for their people, "One Nation, one religion,
one culture."
Does that make all Indian people racist for selecting the BJP Party?
Conman Peter Foster to face the music
Peter Foster was yesterday told by Magistrate Brian Hine that he would have
to go back to England to face fraud charges there.
Foster, who disappeared while on bail a few months ago,
was recently captured
and forced to front the courts to face extradition. The conman has
claimed that his life will be in peril if he is sent back to England.
Outside the Courts Foster's solicitor Sean Cousins questioned the motivation
for the extradition saying that the decision would be appealed.
In the meantime the friend of the Foster family, Agnes Tatay, who put up
her Gold Coast home as security for Foster's bail appears likely to lose
her only asset in the world... another victim on the Foster files.
Amnesty International looking for a lost
cause?
That politically correct international group called
Amnesty International
are always looking for a cause to increase their profile, so they
came to Australia yesterday to jump on the "stolen generations" bandwagon.
It matters little that the
"Bringing
them Home" report by Sir Ronald Wilson and his anti-Australian Human
Rights and Equal Opportunities Commission has been totally discredited.
The classic statement by Ron Brunton,
"Whether John Howard should apologise to the
“stolen generations” for the actions of previous governments for
which he personally had no responsibility, one thing is certain: as the
organisation that is responsible for such an unworthy report, the Human Rights
and Equal Opportunity Commission should apologise to all Australians: Aboriginal
and non-Aboriginal," is totally ignored in the interests of balance
like so much else undertaken by these misguided do-gooders.
Amnesty International yesterday called on the Australian Government
to apologise to the so-called "stolen children" and to compensate them.
Petty politics dominates Queensland state
affairs
Motor-mouth, ALP state opposition leader Peter Beattie is finding that the
snakes are coming back to bite him. Over the last few weeks allegations and
counter-allegations have flowed between the state Coalition and the ALP over
travel and expense rorting... a few weeks ago this led to the
resignation
of three Coalition ministers who were implicated in affairs with
their staff following revelations made by the ex-wife of one of them, Mrs
Hobbs.
The ALP were vocal in their contrived indignation and disgust (as they have
proved no better) with Beattie being at the forefront of allegations of misuse
of tax payer moneys by Coalition minister - implying that they were squeaky
clean until the revelation of Hamill's Au$350 liquor bill... in a two hour
sitting with nine guests...
Things have not got any better. Now the Coalition are biting back, two days
ago Cabinet documents from the Goss days were released revealing that Beattie
had lied. Beattie said that the Eastlink power project, if it had been given
the go-ahead by the Coalition, could have been completed in time - which
Beattie claimed would therefore have helped Queensland business over the
power shortage problems faced on Monday this week. The documents showed otherwise
with motor-mouth going through all shades of the rainbow as he exploded in
Parliament claiming that the Coalition, by tabling the Cabinet records, had
broken a Parliamentary convention... presumably that you don't blab on your
"mates". (The tweedle-dee and tweedle-dum syndrome).
Beattie has now told senior public servants that the release of the Cabinet
documents amounted to "serious misconduct"... strange that the same interest
in the Goss shredding
fiasco has escaped his attention all this time.
Now Premier Rob Borbidge has gone one step further threatening to withhold
tax payer funding for recent trip to Taiwan by Peter Beattie. Well-travelled
Beattie, it appears, had already used up his overseas travel "allocations"
with a tax payer paid world trip late year. Borbidge had earlier approved
of the Taiwan trip if the Opposition leader's office could cover the trip
from their budget. Now budgets are a hot topic of course, because it was
just a few days ago that Beattie was caught telling porky pies again when
he said that he had turned down an
increase
to his salary package proposed by Borbidge. It turned out,
again through a document tabled by the Coalition in Parliament that late
last year Beattie had personally jumped at the proposed extra dollars in
his pocket.
Now Borbidge has said that the three day trip, which Beattie took last
week, has no justification as details of the trip have not yet been
forwarded by Beattie. Beattie responded to Borbidge in writing, "The programme
was being adjusted even at the time I left Queensland, but the Queensland
office in Taipei was kept totally abreast of the arrangements as they were
advised to my office."
Borbidge was not satisfied by Beattie's answer so he demanded full documentation
of the trip by 5pm or Beattie would lose his support for the tax payer funded
expenditure.
Beattie responded writing, "I find your latest correspondence unnecessary
and offensive. Obviously the strain is getting to you, and I seriously wonder
whether you are capable of continuing as Premier of this state given the
pettiness of your approach and the threat made in your letter... I feel sorry
for you."
Borbidge responded to the media last night saying, "What I am doing is enforcing
the standards that the Opposition leader would insist that I apply to my
ministers.
"I gave Mr Beattie the courtesy - something the Goss government would never
do - of a second overseas trip even though he is only entitled to one in
each parliamentary term.
"Mr Beattie would jump up and down if my ministers did not meet standards
when they travel overseas."
Borbidge makes sense to me.
Making the
news" -
an indepth exposé of media and political collusion at the highest
possible levels in Australia.
Political:
Ian Sinclair takes the "hot" seat in
Parliament
Ian Sinclair, known as "Sinkers" found himself in hot water yesterday when
he took on the Australian Labor Party (ALP) from his new position as Speaker
of the house.
His ascendency
followed the sudden resignation of Bob Halverson yesterday, and his
powerful performance at the recent
Constitutional
Convention.
Sinclair started his reign in the chair by banning the ALP's supplementary
questions raising the petty ire of the likes of front benchers Kim Beazley
and Gareth Evans. Evans saying Sinclair was a "charming rogue but a head
kicking rogue nevertheless. Having a charming rogue in the seat is a definite
advantage on having a non-charming one".
"But beyond that I don't think you'll get any huge expression of confidence
by the Opposition because we know Sinkers' form.
"No Speaker in the Australian parliamentary tradition is ever really independent
of party, they just differ in their capacity to conceal that reality," he
said.
The classic move of the day was by Simon Crean - who worked his way up into
the ALP leadership through the violent ranks of the Australian Council
of Trade Unions (ACTU). Crean tried to pass a dissent motion against
Sinclair - a move which was defeated through the superior numbers of the
Coalition.
Oxley pre-selection candidate Anne Scott put in
the hot seat.
Anne Scott the wife of Les Scott - the MP displaced by Pauline Hanson in
the seat of Oxley in 1996 - has been told that her husband should surrender
his parliamentary pension if she wins her bid to represent Labor in the seat
of Oxley.
Mrs Scott, who
is a misguided letter writer, was told by Labor Party national secretary
Gary Grey that voters would find it grotesque if Les Scott continued to receive
his Au$30,000 pa parliamentary pension if she represented the voters of Oxley
and received a parliamentary salary as well.
Mrs Scott responded by saying, "I think some of these people think women
don't even deserve the vote," with Gray's comments being seen by her supporters
as being an attempt to derail her campaign.
"I made her aware that I thought the people of Oxley would not be enamoured
by a candidate who had a partner in receipt of a parliamentary pension at
the same time as she would be seeking public office and remuneration as a
Federal Member of Parliament," Gray said yesterday.
"I assume that if Anne Scott were to be successful in her pre-selection that
her husband Les would find a way of handing back his superannuation so you
didn't have the case of a family double dipping, which would be thought of
in ALP circles and in the community in general as being grotesque.
Mrs Scott has said that she wants to represent the battlers in the past -
causing Gray to comment, "Families have already sent a message that they
are doing it hard."
She dodged the issue by saying, "If it seen as a problem I am quite willing
to bring forward a private members bill to change the Superannuation Act."
Yeah, and pigs will fly before they (the politicians) take their noses out
of that trough...
I wonder when the ALP will question the "double dipping" by Michael and Linda
Lavarche, and Bobb and Brenda Gibbs?
Social:
A survey by Brian Sweeney and Associates has lifted the lid on Australians'
favourite sport.
It found that mens sports are more popular than womens sports. Some 1500
people were questioned for the survey with the company's research director,
Lewis Jones, saying media coverage influenced preferences, "Men's sport gets
a greater coverage on television, radio and in newspapers and that is what
generates an interest in those sports.
"We would assume that because women's sports get much less media coverage,
fewer people are interested in it."
Here is a table of the results:
% OF POPULATION
| Sport |
Interest |
Participation |
Attendance |
TV viewing |
Radio listening |
| Swimming |
59 |
45 |
5 |
33 |
0 |
| Cricket (outdoor) |
54 |
11 |
20 |
50 |
10 |
| Australian Rules |
50 |
5 |
23 |
48 |
9 |
| Tennis |
50 |
26 |
8 |
42 |
1 |
| Soccer |
41 |
7 |
11 |
39 |
1 |
| Motor Racing |
39 |
2 |
10 |
36 |
0 |
| Rugby League |
38 |
3 |
13 |
36 |
3 |
| Golf |
37 |
22 |
6 |
30 |
0 |
| Basketball |
35 |
11 |
12 |
30 |
1 |
| Gymnastics |
34 |
2 |
2 |
32 |
0 |
Another perfect day in paradise.
Have a good one.
Return to Australian National
News of the Day
#
See GLOBE International for
other world news.
anotd
