International:

Hanson team to meet tomorrow.

Pauline Hanson's executive will meet with her tomorrow at a secret location tomorrow.

The team will meet with other senior Queensland representatives and branch executives to discuss the upcoming state and federal elections.

I expect to be there and will report back on the outcome of the day.

Just who are "Death Watch"?

The other day we demonstrated the blatant lies being told by the "Aboriginal Deathwatch in Perth" including chair Glenn Shaw who used the ALP's discredited Left Link website to publicise their garbage to radicals, like Nattyreb, to the on-line international community.

Interesting is this extract from the letter below which is an exact quote from the Nyungah Circle of Elders web pages...:
"The Chair of the Committee is Glenn Shaw (the author of the "media release") an indigenous Australian who works at the Aboriginal Legal Service and Kath Mallott is the Executive Officer. The membership is varied and includes senior judges from the W.A. justice system, politicians, ex-politicians, indigenous Australians from all walks of life, university professors, professional educators, business people, church leaders - both ordained and lay people, and ordinary common-or-garden people such as yours truly staffy@omen.com.au, but then I s'pose that no person on this Committee could be described as "ordinary."

Do you need any more proof that the legal and education system in this country is a joke if this "media release" represents their perception of the truth?

Below is another example of the sort of trash that is being churned out through Left Link. Again this post was forwarded by Left Link and then copied by Nattyreb and sent to its sympathisers. Can you wonder that such a distorted picture is getting out there - all in the cause of creating support for a boycott to the Sydney 2000 Olympics... and guess who will be guests of honour to the Olympic event (especially if they win the next Federal election)... the cohorts Kim Beazley and the likes of Carmen Lawrence and Cheryl Kernot... makes me feel sick in the stomach!

Here is the latest Left Link post which they forwarded to Nattyreb:

Aboriginal activist Robert Thorpe has lost his final High Court bid, to have his allegations of Aborginal genocide taken to the International Court of Justice.

He now plans to independently take the case into the international arena, and believes there is a network of supporters overseas who will help him.

Mr Thorpe wanted the High Court to declare that the Commonwealth owed a fiduciary obligation to Aboriginies, based on the harm inflicted on them over the past 200 years.

He also asked the court to order the Commonwealth to take the case to the United Nations' International Court of Justice.

Mr Thorpe says he cannot take his case any further in Australia, but is confident about its future internationally.

"We know where we're going to succeed is in the international court," he said.

"The only time Aboriginal people have ever had any impact is when they've exposed things at an international level.

"Forget about everything else - nothing works. It's that international exposure which brings home the point to Australia."

Hanson not to blame.. please explain.

A report just released by the Tourism Forecasting Council (TFC) states that Australia could lose up to 3,000,000 inbound tourists a year by 2006 because of the Asian currency crisis.

The Federal Tourism Minister, Andrew Thomson, commissioned the report to assess the impact of the Asian currency crisis on Australia's Au$55 billion tourism industry.

The reports states that growth in the industry will drop from its current rate of 7.8% per annum to as low as 3.6% because of the crisis.

The report predicts that, despite a dramatic fall off in Asian visitors and increase in tourists from Europe can be expected.

"Tourism will continue to play a major role as a job creator and valuable export earner.. the industry is very diverse," said TFC Chairman Sir Frank Moore.

"The majority of our markets are mature, stable and large enough to offset the Asian turbulence. Due to the dynamic nature of the economic changes in Asia, it is difficult to predict the final outcome with any certainty."

Nice to see Hanson left off the traditional "to blame" list for once.

Prince William to follow Rupert Murdoch?

There is a very good chance that Prince William will follow in the footsteps of Rupert Murdoch... as far as his education is concerned.

Prince Charles also attended Geelong Grammar's Timbertop - Australia's most exclusive school - however in Charles' day it was boys only but now it is co-ed.

Timbertop, compared with Eton College, has had students like Kerry Packer, Rupert Murdoch and Alexander Downer..

Thorny rose?

The ongoing saga of Rose Hancock-Porteous and Gina Rinehart continues in the Perth courts.

Rose started her life in the backstreets of the Philippines until she came to Australia and struck it lucky working as the housemaid for one of Western Australia's wealthiest men, Lang Hancock. Within a short period of time Rose married Lang and started to spend up big - she is believed to have soaked about Au$30 million from Lang before he died.

When Lang Hancock died a few years ago the suspicious circumstances resulted in police checking the couple's mansion for drugs and rumours being circulated at the time that he had been drugged to death. It was quite a scandal - but nothing as bad as what was to follow when Rose married a real estate agent not long after Lang's body was put to rest.

Rose still has one final challenge ahead of her and that is where Lang's daughter Gina Rinehart fits in. It is no secret that Gina does not like Rose much and shares the feelings of millions of other Australians that Rose had nested on a golden egg.

It appears that ten days before Lang died he changed his will leaving practically everything to Gina. Of course Rose was furious and now she is taking the will through the courts.

Justice Kerry White yesterday threw out Rose Hancock-Porteous' application for an urgent hearing on the issue.

On one side Gina Rinehart has called for an inquest into her father's death - saying that the outcome would "embarrass" Rose. Rose, meanwhile, claims that the original (earlier) will was copied during a break-in and that Lang was presented with the new will by Rinehart's lawyers when he was very sick.

Political:

Cheryl Kernot yesterday won a predictable selection at the Australian Labor party branch meeting as their Dickson candidate.

Today the Courier Mail describes the selection as "a stunning victory"...

Her competitor... well yes the son of disgraced Labor Senator Mal Colston, David Colston. The count revealed that 129 had voted for Kernot with 3 votes for Colston.

Her preselection is certain to be ratified by the Labor Electoral Council as she already has Kim Beazley's very public support.

You Say:

From: "Deaths In Custody Watch Committee (WA) Inc."

http://www.omen.com.au/~staffy/watch.html

The Chair of the Committe is Glenn Shaw an indigenous Australian who works at the Aboriginal Legal Service and Kath Mallott is the Executive Officer. The membership is varied and includes senior judges from the W.A. justice system, politicians, ex-politicians, indigenous Australians from all walks of life, university professors, professional educators, business people, church leaders - both ordained and lay people, and ordinary common-or-garden people such as yours truely staffy@omen.com.au, but then I s'pose that no person on this Committee could be described as "ordinary."

Telephone: 61 9 328-5316 or 61 9 328-7877
Fax: 61 9 328-8132

Shane

Subject: TAKE A LITTLE LESSON FROM MY EXPERIENCE.

To The EDITOR,

I am fast approaching sixty and have probably crammed a lot of living into my time. My field of experience's have been mainly involved in close people contact. My short resume is to qualify what I have to say.

I spent some twenty two years in the armed forces, a period working in a maximum security prison, six and a half years as a special constable in the retail loss prevention areas and eight years as an outdoor inquiry officer for a commonwealth department until my forced medical retirement. The period as an inquiry officer is the most significant period that relates to this topic.

I spent about one and a half years of this eight year period working with interpreters of various languages working through areas like Cabramatta, Fairfield, Campsie, Liverpool and the general Western areas of metropolitan Sydney. I then moved on doing the same inquiry work covering areas from Port Macquarie to Tweed Heads, Moree, Coonabarabran, Bourke Dubbo and most of the western areas of New South Wales.

All of this time was spent interviewing people of all races in their homes and listening to their many views on all matters, their day to day problems and how these things effected them in their particular cases. It is a pity that this type of experience is not mandatory to entry into Parliament. The need of each group and individual do not vary very much but one thing that came out clear was their fear of government, particularly by New Australians.

Most of these people come from countries where the authorities have absolute power without recourse in any manner, there would be no escape from the follow up persecution of any person considered by the authorities to be a threat.

A lot of these people come to this new country harbouring the same fear of authority. As a result they are easily manipulated by other people who they view as some kind of authority, hence one reason these New Australians group together in tight communities.

By governments and government departments setting up funded organisations they are in fact able to control information being fed to the people through these organisations and to use their fears against them sometimes to electoral advantage.

Most of these people come from countries where their is no social security system and without family support they would perish. When all the family is reliant on some form of government payment the whole family feels threatened.

One of these fears greatly exploited is the False Fear that any government other than the one in power or one with which they have experienced may deport them back to where they came or they may take away their source of income be it social security or some other thing. To my way of thinking this perceived type of threat however subtle is intimidation by stealth.

I have experienced this fear in people that I have interviewed and I have on many occasions had to go to great lengths to calm the fears they perceived while waiting for my visit.

I believe that recent governments use this ill perceived venerability to exercise a form of power over many sections of the Australian community.

Most Australian families, regardless of origins, have become reliant on some form of payment, be it in the form of child allowance, additional family payments or some other concession for lower income earners. I believe a hidden policy has been in place for some time to enable control by stealth.

Australians in this position become something like the battered wife who is fully dependent, and nowhere to run. In fear of losing what little security they have.

So they put up with the bad treatment. (In this case treatment by the Government)

When working through the outback of New South Wales I was able to see the devastation of our farming industry first hand, the immense pain and suffering caused by drought and lack of support from the governments of the day.

In particular the suffering during and since the twenty or so years of Labor and Liberal/National governments.

The foreclosures by banks trying to recover Monies instead of extending credit after the reckless period of lending to the high fliers, the Deregulation of banks and methodical removal of tariffs and other industry protections. Not to mention the ruthless closing of banking facilities in country areas, all with the governments blessings.

I spoke to once proud country people in their homes who have lived and toiled in the far remote areas of this country for generations now reduced to absolute poverty, bare properties and machinery sheds now empty, the machines sold up by the banks.

The fencers, shearers, drovers, operators, hundreds of small business in country towns.

Where there was once thriving communities and hope for the future, now only despair.

Once, because we had the industry, your child could choose most any trade to pursue.

Our steel industry is closing down. Yet we have some of the richest deposits of minerals in the world but we can no longer process the products, we ship them overseas then buy them back in finished form. In doing this we are even throwing away Australia's ability and the years of learnt skills of our workforce, now unemployed.

I have friends who have struggled for decades to survive on the land raising cattle and crops but are going broke because they cannot compete with large foreign owned cattle companies that fatten their cattle on Australian soil then taking the product back to their protected markets and taking all the profits out of the country with them, how could any government with Australian Interests at heart allow this type of thing to happen?

Farmers are turning there fruit and crops back into the ground because of cheap imports of fruit and crops. Governments have Killed the textile industry, killed the manufacturing industry, in the process of killing the sugar industry and anything else they can do to wreck this countries ability to be self sufficient.

This country still needs all of these things but it is all shipped in from overseas, why? Governments are talking about level playing fields in world trade but what they are not telling the people of Australia is that we are at the high end of the field and to achieve a level field WE will need to be brought down to the level of other less fortunate countries.

This means a lower standard of living for all people, except of course for the Money People who will be the ONLY PEOPLE to benefit from such a scheme.

All of these things can be squarely laid at the feet of any government that has been in power since the early 1970's, they are Pouring Billions into well known corrupt overseas governments forgetting their oath to Govern Australia for All Australians.

Whatever happened to the belief that, Charity Begins At Home.

This country once produced almost all things we needed and our youth were sure of employment in most any field they could choose, now we import not only consumer goods, but the very food we need to survive.

What a shocking indictment of our leaders to have allowed this sort of thing to happen.

The once proud and relatively powerful Armed Forces we once had have been reduced to a state where they would only be able to move deploy and supply one single fighting battalion within the confines of Australia. With all our forces we could probably defend one port for a few days only.

By then we would be out of ammunition anyway because we have shut down our ammunition factories along with our arms factories.

We have civilian companies flying a very inadequate coastal watch over most of our northern coastline.

This is all that is left from a force that once boasted two aircraft carriers and three fully trained and equipped battalions plus an aircraft building and servicing industry.

I recently watched an interview with an Officer from the F18 fighter Squadron after a northern exercise, he said at the time, "WHAT WE HAVE NOW, IS WHAT WE GO TO WAR WITH, THERE WILL BE NO TIME TO PREPARE " Well is that frightening or not? I ask you.

Our Airfield construction Squadrons were disbanded a long time ago. Our Chinook Helicopters were in mothballs and unusable during that big flood some time ago. ( During Hawkes Government )

Our Army is poorly equipped, our F111's are over 30 years old with no plans to replace them until they are, get this, 50 years old.

We have no semi trained force ready to backup our troops other than a small reserve force of weekend soldiers.

Most people I have spoken to support the idea of a national service program of some type, the idea being somewhere for our youth to gain training and experience and to learn teamwork, and many of the basic needs to live a useful life. The costs would be regained in work generated in the civilian supply areas needed to support such a program. The Australian Public would welcome such a scheme.

I am certain a referendum would support such a proposal, but heavens that would be us instructing the government, that would never do.

This and other governments of late subscribe to the view that there is no threat in the foreseeable future. Nor were many other conflicts that have occurred in the past two decades.

The best that Australia can do these days to assist in problem areas is to send in a medical team or an unarmed force to keep peace. God knows what would happen if we had to defend our country against invasion or if we had our territory annexed like Territories just to our north were.

For all the posturing by our Leaders they know that they, and their families, would be flown out to safety at the first sign of danger. Along with most of OUR Treasury.

The Power Brokers, Bankers, and of course the Media Chiefs would be on the same plane though, I guess, they can afford their own Jumbo in this economic climate, made favourable to them by recent Governments. I can visualise our leaders in a rare show of unity standing at the top of the stairway of the departing aircraft issuing a joint statement saying, " WE SHALL RETURN ".

Each government has taken power waving the flag of follies committed by their predecessors, they do nothing to change anything they screamed about in their pre electoral posturing.

I was talking to an old retired farmer in one outback town, we were talking about a local councils plan to put new air conditioned offices up for the council workers. This old man was offended, he said to me, " Air Conditioned Officers for the Council, With Our Money earned slaving in the heat and the dust to earn it, One Billion on a Parliament House where it costs $200 dollars to change one light bulb. With the size of this country they should still be holding Parliament under "A BLOODY GUM TREE".

I believe he has a point, Governments serving themselves.

Even when you read the Web Pages of the ACTU they are pushing views that the global interests in the supply of goods from overseas is OK and that employment of the Australian workforce should, ONE DAY pick up in the unskilled Service Areas, Where I ask do our youth obtain SKILLED WORK and TRAINING let alone some industry in which to apply the learned skills?
Will they have to go OVERSEAS to find skilled work? Or maybe ACTU does not represent Skilled Workers.
I have little doubt this lot are working together to some predetermined plan which the Australian Voter is not privy to.

WAKE UP BEFORE ITS TOO LATE AUSTRALIA, DEMAND OUR COUNTRY BACK.

Tony Fitzpatrick

Personal trivia, from the global office:

Another perfect day in paradise.

Will be canoeing down the river later today.

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