My following column appears in the Guardian today: Australians love consuming illicit drugs. We enjoy smoking, inhaling and losing our minds.… Figures released by the Bureau of Statistics in June found that we are spending more than $7bn a year on a cocktail of various substances.… The “war on drugs”, applied haphazardly by law enforcement, costs us…
What vulture capitalism has done to America
The facts are grim and economic prosperity is nothing more than a dream for the majority of Americans. Policies over decades, something I investigate in my new book Profits of Doom, have contributed to today’s malaise. New figures, via Associated Press, signal the trauma: Four out of 5 U.S. adults struggle with joblessness, near-poverty or…
Chomsky praises Snowden and condemns US hypocrisy
Typically eloquent Noam Chomsky, speaking this weekend at the Geneva Press Club: My own opinion is that Snowden should be honored. He was doing what every citizen ought to do, telling. [Applause] He was telling Americans what the government was doing. That’s what’s supposed to happen. Governments as I mentioned before always plead security no…
When insider media meets war mongers group hugging obligatory
The vast majority of so-called journalists in the mainstream media ain’t interested in reporting fairly about the role of US power; they want to be an extension of it. A fascinating insight by Max Blumenthal in Alternet on a recent love-in: Seated on a stool before an audience packed with spooks, lawmakers, lawyers and mercenaries,…
Julian Assange: “We live in a media-ocracy”
Strong speech by the Wikileaks founder Julian Assange, on his party’s media platform and need to challenge insider journalist’s culture, at today’s Splendour in the Grass music festival: Julian Assange speaks at Splendour In The Grass from WikiLeaksParty on Vimeo.
Voice of Russia interview on asylum seekers and privatisation
Yesterday I received a call out of the blue from a producer in Moscow asking if I’d like to be interviewed by The… Voice of Russia about Australia’s refugee policies. It was conducted live. Let nobody say that Australia’s ever-worsening cruelty isn’t being noticed by the world: A boat carrying Asian refugees to Australia has sunk…
2SER interview on Papua New Guinea and vulture capitalism
The issue of Australia outsourcing troubles to its neighbour Papua New Guinea (PNG) remains in the news after Canberra aims to send all asylum seekers arriving by boat to this poor nation. Let’s not forget that private companies are making huge money from the mess, a topic related to my new book, Profits of Doom.…
“The Act of Killing” documentary challenges history, reality, genocide
How we remember history and the violence within it is one of the great challenges of our age. From the Holocaust to Cambodia and Rwanda to Palestine, we are all haunted by holding power to account. Last night I watched one of the most remarkable documentaries I’ve ever seen, Joshua Oppenheimer’s The Act of Killing:…
Israel’s less than silent cleansing of Bedouins
Forget all the media babble about a “peace process” in the Middle East. It’s a distraction from the main game. US journalist Ben Ehrenreich, writer of the wonderful recent New York Times magazine cover story on non-violent Palestinian resistance in the West Bank, reports for the Los Angeles Review of Books: It would be a…
Education is key to fighting disaster capitalism
Henry Rollins is a passionate and cluey American who has spent years fighting the corporate take-over of the state. Here’s his 2012 talk on education being the key in tackling disaster capitalism. A great way to introduce my new book, Profits of Doom: