So this is how a Serious writer commentates in a Serious newspaper. Christopher Pearson in Saturday’s Australian: To consolidate their own position as parties for grown-ups, Labor and the Coalition should always speak of the Greens as the infantile party: resolutely irresponsible, innumerate and a threat to the economy. They should also be pointing out…
Showing all posts tagged Australia
Yes, Australia imprisons children
This is how Australia treats refugees, including children, when they come seeking asylum; under lock and key for months and longer:
Speak in hushed tones around the Great Leader
Yet another example of the lack of bravery in the Murdoch press in Australia, so keen to dish out dirt but afraid to listen to criticism. It’s an empire built on Rupert’s largesse and when he goes…
Platitudes over Afghanistan were already irrelevant in 2001 post 9/11
What happens when a compliant corporate journalist simply reprints what a military man tells him? Welcome the Sydney Morning Herald’s Peter Hartcher, repeating pro Afghan war propaganda with no contrary views. This is what embedding “journalism” is all about: The Australian officer in charge of the Afghanistan deployment has told Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott…
Failing to take responsibility for what Zionism has created
Following the publication of the Independent Australian Jewish Voices advertisement across the Australian media yesterday, Zionist columnist Mark Baker writes in the Australian Jewish News that debate over “Jewish” issues should be wider but he still wants to proscribe certain boundaries. He condemns the lack of “balance” in the IAJV statement, implying somehow that both…
Australian Jews say enough is enough
The following advertisement appears prominently in today’s Sydney Morning Herald and Australian [in a slightly different version] and in this week’s Australian Jewish News, organised by Independent Australian Jewish Voices:
Outsourcing detention centres open to mental and physical abuse
The following article is in this week’s Green Left Weekly newspaper: During recent protests in Villawood Detention Centre that followed the September 20 suicide of detained Fijian exile Josefa Rauluni, detainees who tried to help rooftop protesters with water and blankets were stopped by security. One man was bashed. Hunger strikers were kept quiet in…
Afghans, your nation is paradise so please bugger off home
This is truly criminal. The Australian government is seriously claiming that Afghanistan is safe for its citizens but I’ll allow you to read their choice of words: Refugee groups fear a “flawed” government assessment of Afghanistan will unfairly taint asylum-seekers’ applications to stay in Australia. The assessment by the Australian embassy in Kabul, dated February…
Roll up for another few decades of settlement expansion in Palestine
My following article appears on ABC’s Unleashed today: Will they or won’t they? The international media were counting down the hours until Israel’s self-described “settlement freeze” ended this week. Most Western journalists, based in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, looked for any signs from the government of Benjamin Netanyahu that would appease the perceived outrage of…
Australia may have followed Julian Assange into the toilet
Exposing state crimes in the “war on terror” comes with a price. And don’t expect governments to protect you: Australian spy agencies may have monitored the WikiLeaks spokesman Julian Assange, and the Attorney-General would welcome prosecution of the group’s members if offences could be proved. The new claims come less than three weeks before the…