Keating produced an array of serious objections to the AUKUS deal.
None was a quibble. Each separately underlined why it was bad for Australia, bad for peace, and, possibly, likely to increase the chance of war between the US and China. Each also invited real questions about the calibre of Australian politicians – current or in the previous administration – and national security officials who, as usual have put the interests of the US ahead of the quite separate national interests of Australia.
-- "Albanese a pale shadow of Keating, even on subs" - Pearls and Irritations
Decades of rewarding the wealthy for just being wealthy at taxpayer expense has not merely entrenched an unfair status quo, but extended it to the point that Australians aren’t living in a shared economy any more, but two distinct and separate ones. An accruing cash account is not merely a symptom, but a metaphor. Those who already have wealth receive disproportionate government favour for owning more property, for buying private education, for having private health insurance. Stage-three tax cuts, anyone? What great good fortune to those already possessed of great good fortune.
-- "Does Australia have the appetite for economic change, or are we stuck with a system that rewards the rich?", Van Badham, The Guardian
Forget new coal and gas; the emissions from existing fossil fuel projects, alone, could be enough to blow the remaining global carbon budget by the end of the decade if they carry on unabated.
-- "IPCC climate warning leaves no room for coal and gas, little room for offsets", Sophie Vorrath, RenewEconomy.com.au
And the current big debate, surrounding the scheme known as the ‘Safeguard Mechanism‘, essentially puts off mandating real climate action among the highest emitters (mostly coal and gas companies) by allowing full compliance with reducing baselines to be met using cheap, highly-suspect and deeply insufficient carbon offsets, instead of real reductions within the companies covered by the scheme (along with a smorgasbord of other loopholes). It is a policy designed with one philosophy in mind: Don’t worry. We’ll do it later.
-- Ketan Joshi, "New IPCC report shows Labor’s approach is deadly and reckless", reneweconomy.com.au
I have been thinking a lot about the Ukraine war, and I am very concerned. This is a war that is extraordinarily dangerous and should never have happened (see the Addendum). This is not simply a war that Putin decided to launch, unprovoked, on February 24, 2022. That is nonsense for anyone who has been around. I was an adviser to President Mikhail Gorbachev; I was an advisor to President Boris Yeltsin; I was an advisor to President Leonid Kuchma, the first president of independent Ukraine; and to others. What you’re being told about this conflict and others is simply not true. I say that based on firsthand experience of more than 30 years.
-- Jeffrey Sachs, "The geopolitics of peace in a post-Western world - Pearls and Irritations", Pearls and Irritaiions
romaincrisis
izzy806
discoholicmusic
theartofmadeline
ellievsbear
gummygunk
origamiaround
kaledo-art
