THE PARABLE AND PARADOX OF SANTA HENRY. By Eugene Elander

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THE PARABLE AND PARADOX OF SANTA HENRY. By Eugene Elander

It's not long until Christmas, and throughout our fair land, Santa Henry's soon coming, with largesse in his hand; Every lender and bank, whether naughty or nice, Has Santa Henry to thank, as each grabs his own slice.

It's certainly true that U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson doesn't look much like the traditional depiction of Santa Claus. However, in 2008 America he is playing that role with a vengeance which will undoubtedly affect and afflict all of us for decades to come. Indeed, Santa Henry's trillion-dollar giveaway to those who caused much of the present financial crisis is already arriving. While it may seem paradoxical, not to mention inappropriate, to reward those who got us into the present economic mess, Santa Henry is loyal to his former Wall Street colleagues, investment bankers, and other assorted cronies. They are Santa Henry's Elves, in a manner of speaking.

Consider that Santa Henry's case for this trillion-dollar-plus bailout (it's occurring in stages to make it look smaller, but we should know better) changed totally recently.

He had advocated for most of the Fall of 2008 the need for the U.S. Treasury over which he presides to buy up "toxic assets" such as bad and unwise loans made by the financial sector, to rescue those financial institutions from their own greed and bad decisions. The U.S. Congress was panicked into giving him his way, to the tune of the larger part of that trillion dollars, under threat of a total financial meltdown if Congress did not comply.

As the weeks passed after Santa Henry got his way on the first round of the bailout, some of us began to wonder what was being done with such an unbelievable amount of money.

Little effect was seen: homeowners were still losing their homes, companies were still going belly up, while financial institutions such as AIG staged lavish celebrations fueled in part with bailout money. It has been much like rewarding the fox for eating the hens.

But just when hard questions began to be asked, and left unanswered, by Santa Henry and other bailout advocates and leaders, we were treated to an astounding press conference.

Santa Henry told us that he and his ilk were not in fact going to use that good old trillion dollars to buy up toxic assets, bad loans, and other remnants of the incompetence of the leaders of our financial sectors. No, Santa Henry had seen a new light, a new unholy grail to pursue, while stating blithely that he would never be one to fail to change his mind when confronted with new "facts" - facts largely of his own creation, of course.

Now, Santa Henry has had a new vision, an epiphany, a revelation......you get the idea. He will use that trillion-or-so-dollars to buy stock and other ownership interests in our financial sector, making the U.S. government a partner with those who failed to watch their own stores in the first place. His new approach is somewhat like the fox buying a part interest in the henhouse from the weasels.

Santa Henry alleges that the former approach, the one Congress reluctantly approved, would just be too slow to meet the worsening economic and financial crises in the UnitedStates. This implies that he must believe that buying part interests in financial firms represents a faster bailout, although why he would think that is another paradox. After all, once the financial sector has our trillion dollars (more will come from horrendous U.S. public debt increases than from already-strapped taxpayers), why should they use that money to save our financial system? Obviously, our economic gurus, having ignored the worsening home loan crisis for years, and then having failed to act on all the other signs of economic malaise such as massive job losses and the record low in consumer confidence, have neither the ability nor the will to propose realistic solutions.

What is really needed, for starters, would be a thorough review of relevant history, such as FDR's New Deal, the historic World War II Bretton Woods monetary conference, and even the history of the 1980s savings-and-loan crisis and that bailout in the United States.

We could also learn a great deal from how other nations, such as Sweden, have handled their own banking and financial crises. There are undoubtedly solutions to the present short-term financial emergency and long-term economic malaise facing the United States.

Finding and utilizing those solutions must become a major focus for our nation, and in particular for the incoming Obama Administration. We must engage our best and our brightest minds to solve our financial and economic problems. The historical track record of presidents from FDR to Truman to Eisenhower to Kennedy to Ford to Clinton proves that solutions do exist and can be implemented by competent people of good will.

Such solutions are unlikely to be found or implemented by Santa Henry, however; his Elves played a major role in creating our economic and financial problems. Santa Henry's newfound approach, like his immediate previous one, is much like the fox dividing up the henhouse and giving it, along with the chickens, to the wolves and the weasels. Meanwhile, another set of chickens is coming home to roost at Santa Henry's door - and at our doors also, if we fail to act effectively, and very soon.

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One of the predictions I forgot to make for 2009 is one of a media bailout: some sort of Government intervention in the media industry as it plummets into the abyss. I'm probably glad I didn't make it; while there will be a chorus for Government assistance in media this year, no one really knows whether the Obama Administration will be favorable to the calls or not. . . read more

What to Do About Wall Street - By RALPH NADER

4 feb | Soon after the passage in 1999 of the Clinton-Rubin-Summers-P. Graham deregulation of the financial industry, I boarded a US Air flight to Boston and discovered none other than then-Secretary of the Treasury Lawrence Summers a few seats away. He was speaking loudly and constantly on his cell phone. When the plane took off he invited me to sit by him and talk.

After reviewing the contents of this Citibank-friendly new law called the Financial Modernization Act, I asked him: "Do you think the big banks have too much power"?

He paused for a few seconds and replied: "Not Yet." Intrigued by his two word answer, I noted the rejection of modest pro-consumer provisions, adding that now that the banks had had their round, wasn't it time for the consumers to have their own round soon?

He allowed that such an expectation was not unreasonable and that he was willing to meet with some seasoned consumer advocates and go over such an agenda. We sent him an agenda, and met with Mr. Summers and his staff. Unfortunately, neither his boss, Bill Clinton, nor the Congress were in any mood to revisit this heavily lobbied federal deregulation law and reconsider the blocked consumer rights.

The rest is unfolding, tragic history. The law abolished the Glass-Steagall Act which separated commercial banking from investment banking. This opened the floodgates for unwise mergers, acquisitions and other unregulated risky financial instruments. Laced with limitless greed, casino capitalism ran wild, tanking economies here and abroad.

One champion of this market fundamentalism was Alan Greenspan, then chairman of the Federal Reserve. Last October before a House Committee, Greenspan admitted he was mistaken and expressed astonishment at how corporations could not even safeguard their own self-interest from going over steep speculative cliffs.

Greenspan and Summers were deemed "brilliant" by the press and most of Congress. Summers' predecessor at Treasury, Robert Rubin, was also a charter member of the Oracles--those larger-than-life men who just knew that the unfettered market and giant financial conglomerates would be the one-stop shopping mart consumers were assumed to be craving.

Now the world knows that these men belong to the "oops oligarchy" that bails itself out while it lets the companies collapse into the handcuffed arms of Uncle Sam and bridled taxpayers who have to pay for unconditional megabailouts. Instead of the Wall Street crooks being convicted and imprisoned, they have fled the jurisdiction with their self-determined compensation. Corporate crime pays, while pensions and mutual fund savings evaporate.

Now comes the next stage of the Washington rescue effort in a variety of stimulus packages which every vendor group imaginable wants a piece of these days. When trillions are offered, many come running.

As the public focus is on how much, when and where all this money should be spent, there are very serious consequences to be foreseen and forestalled. First, consider how much more concentrated corporate power is occurring. Forced or willing mergers, acquisitions and panic takeovers of big banks by bigger banks along with bankruptcies of companies further reduce what is left of quality competition for consumer benefit.

Remember the anti-trust laws. Obama needs to be their champion. The fallout from the Wall Street binge is likely to lead to a country run by an even smaller handful of monopolistic global goliaths.

In the stampede for stimulus legislation, there is a foreboding feeling on Capitol Hill that there is no proposal on the table to pay for it other than by the children and grandchildren. Just the opposite is raining down on them. Everybody including the private equity gamblers, Las Vegas casinos and Hollywood studios along with the banks and auto companies are looking for tax breaks.

So with the economy deteriorating and taxes being cut, where is the enormous money coming from? From borrowing and from printing money. So look out for big time inflation and decline in the dollar?s value vis-à-vis other currencies.

In all the hundreds of pages of stimulus bills, there is nothing that would facilitate the banding together of consumers and investors into strong advocacy groups. We have long proposed Financial Consumer Associations, privately and voluntarily funded through inserts in the monthly statements of financial firms.

If this bailout-stimulus-Wall Street funny money waste, fraud and abuse sounds confusing, that is because it is. A brand new paperback "Why Wall Street Can't Be Fixed and How to Replace It: Agenda For a New Economy" by long-time corporate critic, David C. Korten will explain some of the wheeling and dealing.

You don't have to agree with all or many of Korten?s nostrums. Just read Part II: the Case For Eliminating Wall Street. He considers three central questions:

First, do Wall Street Institutions do anything so vital for the national interest that they justify trillions of dollars to save them from the consequences of their own excess?

Second, is it possible that the whole Wall Street edifice is built on an illusion of phantom wealth that carries deadly economic, social, and environmental consequences for the larger society?

Third, are there other ways to provide needed financial services with greater results and at lesser cost?

Ralph Nader is an American attorney, author, lecturer, political activist, and perennial candidate for presidency as an independent candidate. . . read more

U.S. Economy : The Philosopher's Stone

18 dec | "When one gets in bed with government, one must expect the diseases it spreads."
- Congressman Ron Paul M.D. . . read more

Trust

12 oct | So it's not money that makes the world go round. Who would have thought. It is that soft commodity associated with mothers, Sensitive New Age Guys and other human species that occasionally cry. Trust. By RENATE OGILVIE . . read more

The Wall Street White House

3 jul | Robert Hormats, Vice Chairman of Goldman Sachs, is to be installed as Under Secretary of Economics, Business, and Agricultural Affairs. This comes as one more, probably unnecessary reminder of the total control exercised by Wall Street over the Obama administration’s economic and financial policy. True, Hormats is “a talker rather than a decider” according to one former White House official, but he will find plenty of old friends used to making decisions, almost all of them uniformly disastrous for the U.S. and global economy. By Andrew Cockburn. . . read more

Living Hungry in America

10 feb | As Walter Thomas knows, it's hard to look for a job when your stomach is rumbling.

The 52-year-old from Washington, D.C., started skipping meals in early January when his savings account was running dry and his kitchen cabinets were almost empty. . . read more

Check Your Perspective

23 sep | Recently, I've read a lot of posts from people who are very angry about the unregulated fat-cats who have been profiting obscenely from our financial system, and whose obscene profits have led to the current financial crisis in the USA... . . read more

Life And Times of a Heating Assistance Worker - From Glossolalia Black

6 apr | Interacting with the public is part of the job description; it's hard when you're talking to a populace that has all sorts of shit going on with them.

There's the people who have never applied for assistance before; white people, uncomfortable, usually women (though in one case it was a handsome white boy with double aught earplugs). They all look bummed, embarrassed to be there. Sometimes they cry.

I usually frame it to them this way: "Don't be ashamed. The legislative powers that be have decided that you fall beneath an arbitrary level that has entitlements. It's to keep people in your tax bracket from falling off the map." And, in a way that is true.

I told one lady, "Tell your asshole brother in law who's dissing you for applying for heating assistance that it keeps you from begging on his doorstep, going on welfare, and it puts extra government money in corporate hands." Because that's the truth, too.

There are the lifers. People with heat and electric bills that they haven't paid in years, kept afloat by the various kinds of assistance that keeps that social strata from rotting on the streets. It's part of society's promise to itself that we not let poor women and children freeze or live in the dark, or by candlelight. Candlelight's bad for a kid's eyes when they're trying to do homework and they're getting no help from their immigrant mom, if you know what I mean.

But, goddamn! Some of these bills could pay for a decent used car! And some of these people are totally without foreseeable prospects. What the hell are we going to do? Me lecturing them only serves to shame them, and some of them wouldn't even fucking listen anyway. And that's on the entirety of the spectrum.

I just try to make it work for these people. I refuse to hold a hand, but I will eyeball someone and say, "Look, you've got a $3,500 electric bill you haven't paid in 3 years. This accumulates. We can't dick around while you make excuses as to why you don't have your proof of income on you. You're going to call your payroll people right now on my phone, make them give you your paycheck stubs, and fill out this form right, you obviously are literate enough to write your own name, write your children's names too, can you read this okay? Okay. Get on it. You gotta stop bullshitting around, lady."

"And if you come back next year with your kid's name on a bill just as big, I might start to get fucking testy."

You can see why I'm made for the paperwork aspect of this job. I am not a diplomat at heart. I am a racist, sexist, bitter old hag with feminist ideals and a big fucking mouth.

Glossolalia Black works for the Public Good. . . read more

Fox Wins the Super Bowl

4 feb | The New York Giants may have caused one of the great NFL boil overs by beating the New England Patriots in Arizona in Super Bowl 43, but the real winner was, of course... Fox Sports US. . . read more

Startups in the Downturn

11 may | Mike Trotzke: Startups in the Downturn . . read more

Previous | Next

President goes up in gas?- by Sean Maguire

So the very unknown Belgian PM Herman van Rompuy, has been elected as EU President- taking up a position that could be instrumental in the future of the region and global international relations in general.

Only a day later, on the opposite and non-EU side of Europe, Russian and Ukrainian officials met, with Putin announcing that he would be easing gas supply terms to a neighbour that is crucial for Russia's European pipelines.

Is it too cynical to think this isn't it a coincidence?

Is it unreasonable to think that as Putin spins a tighter trade web with Former Soviet Republics that this could be his attempt to stand tall and unthreatened by a stronger EU?

Turning Chinese-by Sean Maguire

So Obama is on a whirlwind tour through Asia, espousing the message of 'Pacific' solidarity. On his trip he's been preaching that "the rise of a strong, prosperous China can be a source of strength for the community of nations" and that the US "does not seek to contain" China's rise as a big player on the world stage.

Yet what other choice does the US and Obama have?

The political realities of today tell us that the world and its international institutions will soon be distorted as another lumbering giant enters the fray. It's also a reality that for any successful tomorrow China will have to feature prominently; something that due to inherent cultural and governmental differences will cause friction with the established Western/Free Market model so deeply ingrained in today's thinking.

So how seriously can we believe Obama? Well really we'll just have to wait and see, but if history tells us anything, the rise of China will be anything but 'pacific'.

Bytes of Bites- From The Outsider

Lance Kavanaugh, Senior Product Counsel for YouTube, explained at a meeting in Sydney, that every minute of every day, YouTube uploads 20 hours of videos. So for you to review just one day’s content will take you three years!

Uploads are limited to 10 minutes. YouTube is, thus, doing for video media what tabloids did for news media. Little bits of stuff. Lots of them. Not too taxing on the brain cells and who cares about what’s missing!

It strikes me that Tweets present a similar dynamic. Max 140 characters – including spaces. Frame on.

It’s small wonder cigarettes, McDonalds and iTunes are so popular.

The Weekday Walk of Shame- by Dr Rubber Glove

Another day, another shambling trip home hung-over. The day, like every other post-drunk night was a blur; like cotton-wool had covered my brain, sounds were softer and every movement was an exercise in pain and regret.

And it was all the worse that it was a Thursday afternoon.

School kids were on excursions, young mums pushed prams, and bright happy people looked bright happy and healthy. I though walked through them like I was walking through mud and to cap it off I looked like something that had crawled out from under a slimy rock.

If it was a Saturday or Sunday then this feeling would be oddly exhilarating. I would know that everybody tut-tutting me was really just jealous and that they were looking back wistfully to a time where a couple of days a week could be written off to doing nothing.

A Thursday though is different, nobody looked at me with envy, nobody really even looked at me at all. I was a solid shadow that people tried to look through and it made me feel all the worse for it.

Energy agency warns of 'irreparable' damage- by Jim Giles

Take all the power stations in the United States. Together, they produce almost 1000 gigawatts of electricity - enough to boil several billion kettles simultaneously.

Now imagine building another five power stations for every one that already exists in the United States. That is about the amount of electricity generation that the world is on track to add over the next 20 years.

And three-quarters of the new stations will use fossil fuels. These startling figures were released today by the International Energy Agency. The agency predicts that between a quarter and a third of the new capacity will be built in China, which generates over 40 per cent of its electricity from coal. This will lead to huge increases in carbon dioxide emissions.

The agency has previously said that the current recession has helped rein in emissions, but that effect will not last. The report predicts that 40 billion tonnes of CO2 will be emitted worldwide in 2030, around twice the figure for 1990.

That would put us on a path towards a future in which atmospheric carbon dioxide levels top 1000 parts per million and average global temperature rise by up to 6 °C. Many scientists think that that our goal should be a maximum rise of 2 °C and that 4 °C would cause severe flooding and drought.

The agency describes our current trajectory as almost certain to cause "irreparable" damage to the planet. We are not, of course, locked into this future. The agency's calculation come from a modelling exercise in which we continue on the path we are on now, rather than switch to low-carbon technologies like solar power.

Many governments have already committed to changes, albeit limited ones, so the most dire aspects of the agency's predictions will not come to pass. But they are a useful reminder of just how wrong things will go if we do not take action.

Originally published at New Scientist, click view for more information

Viral app has jail broken iPhones Rick Rolled- by Kara Jensen-Mackinnon

The viral 'Rickrolling' campaign, that inadvertently tricked people into playing Rick Astley's 1987 hit "Never Going to Give you Up" has recently hit Australian iPhones, leaving users in a panic as so far, there is no antidote. Researchers are saying this attack is the world's first iPhone worm, which targets jail broken iPhones (which for the layman are phones that have been unlocked from the service provider).

For the layman as well, when a user jailbreaks an iPhone they are able to access the thousands of applications that didn't conform to the apple guidelines (i.e porn), however it makes the iPhone vulnerable as the terms of the warranty are automatically void.

The worm, aware of this fact, operates by showing a picture of Rick Astley, with the wall paper displaying the message "ikee is never going to give you up". Users who tried to delete the image, found they were unsuccessful when they rebooted their phone.

The hacker 'ikee' who has claimed responsibility for the worm, said that he wanted to bring awareness to the danger of failing to change the iPhones root password, which is a step that is so often forgotten by users.

So far the worm is only in Australia, however now that the idea has surfaced I feel there will be a lot of copycat hackers. So, if you do jailbreak your iPhone make sure to change the root password to avoid these nasty complications.

Graffiti Laws by Sebastien Miller

Nathan Rees recently implemented harsh new laws regarding graffiti and street art. The disgruntled Premier of NSW believes the possession of a can of spray-paint is worth a maximum of six months imprisonment for youth, provided they can’t justify themselves. Along with the introduction of these laws, Rees has announced his plans for an annual graffiti clean-up day, an event that doesn’t share the same promise (but certainly the same scaffolding) as Clean up Australia Day.

Six months is substantial amount of time for the possession of a can of paint, especially considering the leniency of the police and courts regarding drug possession charges. When did spray-paint overtake smack in the great race of illegal possessions? Not to mention these laws are directed mainly at minors; is it really worth locking kids up over something as trivial as this?

What we are lacking is street-art with class. The Premier does live in Western Sydney, and it’s no secret that things are done a little differently out that way, so maybe he’s getting the wrong impression of DIY urban decoration. But how is it graffiti manages to look so fucking cool all over the world, except in the glorious City of Sydney? Riddle me that.

Go Banksy, go!

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7 jul

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Re: Commoditisation of aboriginal art

dear jack do you know anything about the history of Aboriginal 'art'??? Your speculation seems based on complete ignorance of the fact that Aboriginal art was invented for white buyers - the Aborigines themselves having survived 40,000 years without needing to give their lore and laws, myths and legends and rules for survival in a hostile climate any permanent form. It was only our attempts to assimilate them into our 'society' that drove the link to canvas - though the money we paid for their art was a nice bonus, and shouldn't be ignored as a continuing motive for painting. cheers - jeremy

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Re: Farmers and ETS

Thank you for your commentary about farmers in a world of changing climate. Here in the Pacific NW we are not as aware of it as some other places. Our Transition Town group hosted author William Catton last night, who wrote a prophetic book called "Overshoot" back in 1980. During the discussion, a local fish biologist pointed out that of all industries, farmers are the only ones constantly limited by nature. The rest of the world ( with a few exceptions like fishermen or foresters) really do not seem to make their living in a world of limited by forces beyond their control--- or so they imagine. There is a fundamental sanity in these other ways of life that our culture is unwilling to hear. It runs away from the voice of limitation. I think farmers have a lot to teach the world. We always thought there was something wholesome about farming and I think this is exactly it; a lack of hubris. How many slaps in the face will it take before people come to their senses? - Anna Willis

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Re: Turning Chinese

Obama is just a puppet of the Corporate elites.He has not recinded the Patriot Act,Bushes' presidential orders nor habius corpus.Presently ,we have corporate facism. - Ross

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Re: Why Won't God Heal Amputees?

it seems that your whole point and discussion is aimed at christianity. what you state is pretty thought provoking and maybe true but one thing that i have to say is that maybe the whole religion thing has just been corrupted by people and that maybe god does exist.... nomatter all the scientific bull that you and other people can come up with, there are still things that you and scientist just cant explain. ie youe exsistance and the fact that you as a human have suchbrain capacity to do what you do today, and why there is such an order in nature "ofcoures humans always fuck up the order" everything on earth is one complex puzzle that works and you and everyone found it working. not only earth but even beyond to space and shit. now you can say that all this came from a bang and what ever but even if you believe that, what created the platform for that bang and why this place and stuff. just too many things dont add up to just say there is no god. and i think most of these motherfuckers miss the point of this religious shit anyway. because god is not a religion but a spiritual bond. dont be fooled by sensationalism and think that god does not exist cos he does. at least for me. the only problem with this now is that humans have sensationalised everything to make thier shit the best and in part have missed the whole point of god. every human bieng needs something to hold on to. even you and weather it is the image of god that people have painted or not is irrelevent. there is something that you believe in.. you might not go to church and get on your knees but its just part of human nature to associate yourself with something. it could be a superstition or eating chocolate coated roaches whatever you like fact is some things are just bigger than our rational. hope to get a responce from you - esco

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Re: Safran sure to offend, but who cares?

It is an interesting question to pursue "And, is there a ratio that exists where the amount of people offended compared to those that weren't makes something objectively racist?" I suppose the most right answer to whether something is racist or not can only come about democratically. By asking people if they find it racist. Even then (in this currently impossible world where people who want to vote on everything) who gets to vote? Hopefully I do. How do I cast my vote? At the moment I abstain. - Joshua Genner

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Re: The Pointless Question of "What is Art?"

You're article serves as a blatant example of people's lack of knowledge/interest in the contemporary art scene. Some of the most profound and revealing conversations stem from dicussions of art, politics and religion so why label them taboo subject matter? why not let the idiots add in their artistic two cents, because who knows what could happen? a change of opinion... an education... a flash of interest? Perhaps you and your friends to venture down to the COFA 09 annual exhibit and see some 200 fresh sydney artists emerge onto the art scene, unless it's too boring/inane. - Kara

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Re: The Pointless Question of "What is Art?"

I dare say the question is not pointless but rather is made pointless by overcomplications of academia and peripherals of market and status, in which Sean appears to have gotten bogged down notwithstanding the word limit. One of the things we do know about art for a fact is that we humans appear to have always had it around from the caves (who can forget the fetching bison from Alta Mira!) So the issue is cutting through the baggage of history as old as humanity to get back to the fundamentals. It took me about 35 years of research but does not take 100 words. It is this: "Art is something that is designed to communicate thoughts and feelings and to influence our thoughts and feeling through one or more of our senses."(25 words) Since we have space, a rider: "The particular art form is qualified by the particular senses involved in production and reception of that communication. If Sound then Music, If body then Dance. If we use eyes to perceive colour and shape we call it Visual art." How you work the item in question is the matter of objectivity after all some of us eat fruit raw and others make jam. If you choose to make art an investment go for it, if you choose to make it a status symbol you won't be the first. However, in my book, art is really the best at being art and in the immortal words of one Oscar Wilde, for any other purpose "All art is quite useless" - Valerie (Co-incidental author of "Why Art? The Pocket Art Expert)

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Re: John Safran ready for when skit hits the fan

The only aspect of "multiculturalism" we (or any western society)have accepted, revolves around food: sweet and sour chicken or donner kebab..nothing else is relevent, interesting or in anyway beneficial to us. The Cronulla riots were seen as well overdue by most people abroad, we should be proud of standing up to and rejecting ethnic gangs from our pure shores - "Peter Piper"

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Re: Brassed off about creationism- by Andy Coghlan

This is why we need change in Texas and why I'm running for State Board of Education. - Rebecca Bell-Metereau (www.voterebecca.com)

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Re: The Rape Tunnel

It astonishes and intrigues me this 'shock art' Being a over zealous muscled ex con looking for love, where could one find Richard Whitehursts hole?

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Re: ETS Voted Down: Rudd Proves Himself An Evil Genius

Nice to see such an insightful article, despite the snide comments.. Did you read the Quarterly Essay by Guy Pearse in writing the first 5 paragraphs- not that that's a bad thing really. Nice of you to widen your vision beyond the road ahead and take in some history- but I would add one thing- that as it stands (in the senate, especially with Steve Fielding) we won't have a real, meaningful ETS passed. The bummer is that even with a double dissolution election and the resultant simultaneous sitting of both houses of parliament (which as you point out, the greens/minor parties and labor would benefit from) would still not change the ETS from it's current configuration- not unless the Greens tripled their vote. Silly that it all came down to labor preferences to a little known party led by a little know bloke named Steve Fielding and Family First- not that that should be the reason we're in this predicament... - Shaun Lambert

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Re: Evil Capitalists

In response to the "100 Words" on Psychotic Capitalism: The statement, "only psychotics fail to distinguish right from wrong," has a semantic problem. What makes a person psychotic is the inability to recognize that, theoretically, actions or behavior can be right and wrong. A psychologically normal person can do this by age 5. But well- intentioned people constantly disagree about which actions are right and wrong in particular situations. This evening my husband and I re- watched "Zeitgeist--- Addendum" on youtube. We had to restrain ourselves from a festival of paranoia, anger and frustration at what appears to be an evil plot to enslave us all, to bleed us like pods in The Matrix. I cannot argue against the idea that Capitalism--- looked at as a planetary movement--- seems heartlessly destructive, yet there is no single person or even group of Illuminati to blame --- we are willing participants in this plot to rule the world, exploit the human race, rape Mother Earth. All of us are not psychotic, rather we are doing what seems right, and we are following norms set by our culture and community. I personally do my best to support those lawmakers who help us define right at wrong at the transpersonal level--- where this kind of crime being committed, with vast and ultimately very personal consequences. Indeed people can be stupider and meaner in groups than singly --- but whatever the right word is for that, it is not psychotic. Our real problem is that we seem incapable of seeing consequences beyond the local and immediate, we are selfish and shortsighted. But the writer is right: stupid, mean, selfish, shortsighted --- these terms trivialize the unfathomable crimes of Capitalists and their sheep-like dupes. - Anna Willis

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Re: Ethics Implicit?

There is one place where ethics is not "implicit everywhere" and that is television and the media generally - the only ethic is win the audience. This is the toxic environment "informing" students. - Terry McGee

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Re: Australia's Swine Flu vaccination plan

The word "pandemic" has absolutely nothing to do with a deadly disease taking over the planet. The definition of "Pandemic" is simply about the SPREAD of a disease. Any disease. It could be a relatively harmless disease like the Swine Flu, to maybe a more harmful type (like normal seasonal influenza). Nothing to do with how bad or how good it is to your health ... just how WIDESPREAD it is. That is the interpretation of "Pandemic". A word that is nothing to be scared about, but just a measure of the SPREAD of any disease (harmful or relatively harmless) around the globe. The original "Spanish Flu" in 1819 killed 50 to 100 million people worldwide. Swine Flu deaths to date? 2,800 or so. Compare this to up to 500,000 deaths worldwide from our ongoing "Seasonal Flu". People need to see things in perspective. Swine Flu is a mild flu. No need for risky & possibly dangerous vaccinations. No need to be scared. In fact NO NEED TO DO ANYTHING. Just stay cool and take whatever vitamins & health supplements that are appropriate. Good luck & stay informed. - Tim

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Re: Kabul-shit

A nice puncture of the ADF's mad illusions. Shooting civvies in another land used to be called murder, now we pretend its nation building. It must have struck a chord. General Jim Molan, the butcher of Fallujah, who used white phosphorous & put snipers on hospital rooftops, raves in today's SMH about staying true to the mission. What is it with these guys? Untold deaths in Iraq, bombs still exploding, millions of refugees ... and this guy thinks he's a genius. - Tina G

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Re: Why we shouldn't care about he loneliness of the University Liberal

While you have managed to approach, with a complete lack of understanding and sensitivity, the complaints of the many people who feel alienated by the overtly leftist university agenda, I also think that you have failed to address the concerns of an increasingly disenfranchised leftist populace. The article was concerning the Left Handed bigots, not the personal politics of either of the 4 people mentioned. Their concern was not with, as you pointlessly attacked, their political beliefs, but rather with their freedom to express their beliefs and how they were treated on campus because of them. I write this as a disenfranchised leftist. Apparently, freedom of speech on campus somehow took a backseat to the far left's bigotry, however well intentioned they thought it was originally. I'm not right; I'm not left. But fuck anybody that tries to censure me and revoke my right to freedom of speech, merely for believing in a political party. Anyone that thinks that's OK, well simply look up the definition of fascist. - I Swing My Vote

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12 sep

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