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[Reudh]

In Sydney, a 22 year old man has been arrested and charged with terrorism and attempted murder, after he stabbed a random 59 year old pedestrian multiple times, and assaulted the police who came after him, while shouting his support for IS.
The victim is seriously injured, but in stable condition now.

Yeah, I heard about that. I'm personally not overly worried.

[DG]

We've always had people stabbing people here, I personally don't find it scarier when the alleged motivation is ideological. His name made me chuckle, though. It sounded on the news like his first name was Isis.

Anyway, here's a transcript of an address given by Australia's Race Discrimination Commissioner at a festival recently. I found it interesting, so you may too. Fair warning, it's pretty lengthy. It covers populist politics, democracy and race, specifically the hard right's current raison d'ętre: the abolishment of 18C http://www.abc.net.au/religion/articles/2016/09/08/4534889.htm

[Dorsidwarf]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-37481251

Vital political news from Australia courtesy of the BBC News

[Reudh]

Entire state of South Australia without power due to storms. This means that roughly 1,700,000 people are without power. For those of you outside Australia following this thread, this is a sparsely populated, mainly arid state (with the exception of Adelaide and the southern wine regions) roughly the size of France and Germany combined. It is likely to continue for at least a few days, as numerous vital transmission towers were destroyed in the storm.


Naturally, an arch-conservative politician used a natural disaster to try and push his own agenda, stating that it was the renewables that dadgum diddit. Not just any conservative polly, but the Deputy Prime Minister, Barnaby "Is it a crime if I shoot a woman in the belly and kill her unborn child?" Joyce.

Sarcastic people were quick to point out that it was more likely the 80,000 lightning strikes and very high winds that tipped over the transmission towers. In this case, the renewable energy wind turbines were still functioning, they just couldn't deliver any power to the grid, as the transmission towers were dead!

I'll just leave this image here, courtesy of Senator Scott Ludlam:

Spoiler:  Deputy PM Joyce kissing Gina Rinehart (click to show/hide)

Gina Rinehart is a wealthy inherited billionaire. Think a female Trump, though slightly less insane. Rinehart's the heiress to the Lancock mining fortune, a family of miserly, racist shitheads. Her father was well known for promoting an idea that he set up a waterhole for local Aborigines to drink at and poison it. Gina herself has said that she considers the Australian economy to be faltering because quote "Furthermore, Africans want to work and its workers are willing to work for less than two dollars a day. Such statistics make me worry for this country's future."

So yeah, insane conservative MP in bed with the worst kind of capitalist blaming renewable energy? barely makes news, here in Australia.

[DG]

You missed an important verb in paraphrasing Barnaby Carp.

Here's how the LNP see it: When people talk about climate change in relation to bush fires, it's politicizing a disaster. When people talk (incorrectly) about renewables in relation to this power outage it's speaking truth to the Australian people and calling out the dangerous and irresponsible renewable energy sector.

Will it cost them votes? Doubt it.

[BorkBorkGoesTheCode]

Weird thought when viewing image above exposing larger amount of ass end of globe: Why don't we have a politics thread for Antarctica anyway? Considering moving there due to current lack of douche-bag politicians. Power-goal: Become first douche-bag politician of Antarctica and lobby for inclusion into Australasia, found penal colony for illegal immigrants, , profit.

It's taken by the Agarthans.

[Reudh]

Refugees on Manus Island and Nauru, along with those who arrive by boat are now formally banned from ever entering Australia.
This includes those who are assessed and found to be having "genuine refugee" status.

So while there's now outrage over this, this was policy for a long time, it's just now enshrined in law. It's pretty despicable.

[RedKing]

Especially given that Nauru isn't exactly a tropical paradise. More like an overgrown pile of bird poop, whose primary economic activity is recognizing breakaway republics for dosh.

[Reudh]

Especially given that Nauru isn't exactly a tropical paradise. More like an overgrown pile of bird poop, whose primary economic activity is recognizing breakaway republics for dosh.

It was quite rich once! In the 1970s, at the height of their phosphate mining boom, they set up a national trust fund, not unlike Norway and its oil fund, and invested in a shitty little skyscraper in Melbourne. Expensive cars were very common there, and for a period, Nauru was far and away the richest nation per capita in the world.

These days, Nauru House is dilapidated and has long been sold off to other companies, and Nauru itself has something like 92% obesity and massive unemployment.

[Reelya]

I saw a documentary one time on the ABC talking about how their Australian partners were largely responsible for the collapse of the Nauru Phosphate Royalties Trust, and we robbed that shit blind with management fees and bogus costs.

We seem to have whitewashed our involvement in the whole saga, but think about it. A tiny nation of 10,000 people. What are the odds that they'd have the people with financial expertise to manage a trust fund?  At the peak, there was over $1 billion in the fund. It was Melbourne-based Australian finance gurus who were running the entire show. But after the whole thing collapsed we've washed out hands of all involvement and point the finger at those silly Nauru natives.

You can see part of the discrepancy by looking at the figures. We mostly blame spending by Nauru for the bankruptcy. They had $1 billion in savings, and spending blew out such that the government was running deficits of $10 million / year. But that's only 1% of their assets per year. The spending therefore can't have been the main reason the fund collapsed. It had to be the mismanagement, and we were handling that side of things.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nauru_Phosphate_Royalties_Trust

[Jimmy]

A country that gains large amounts of money from a boom in demand for their natural resources and then fails to manage the money effectively until it suddenly dries up?

The horror!

[Edmus]

It is pretty horrific though.
It reminds me of people that have their lives ruined by the lottery.

[Loud Whispers]

It is pretty horrific though.
It reminds me of people that have their lives ruined by the lottery.

Tfw it's true
Really is a matter of too much wealth appearing in too short of a timespan

Lustig, who has two children with his wife of 30 years, said the key to staying happy is to hire a good financial planner and a good accountant after paying off all debts. “I’m smarter than that,” he said. “People, they just don’t think. You have to secure your future.” “The reason why you hear those horror stories about people who win huge amounts like that and all of a sudden they’re filing bankruptcy is because it’s usually from people who have never had that kind of money before in their lives,” he added. “They just go through it like crazy. They think there’s no tomorrow. Well, there is a tomorrow and eventually it will run out.”

Acquire money, acquire consultant

[feelotraveller]

Refugees on Manus Island and Nauru, along with those who arrive by boat are now formally banned from ever entering Australia.
This includes those who are assessed and found to be having "genuine refugee" status.

So while there's now outrage over this, this was policy for a long time, it's just now enshrined in law. It's pretty despicable.

Actually, not yet.  The vote on the legislation is slated for next Monday.  But the bad news is the plan is to backdate the law to 19 July 2013.  Um, yeah, right...  It will probably pass with bipartisan support.

Got to say I am definitely with the Greens on this one.  Shamelessly quoting a press release from Nick McKim, Greens Immigration Spokesperson-

Hieu Van Le, the current Governor of South Australia fled Vietnam by boat in the hopes of reaching Australia almost four decades ago. The story of his arrival in Australia reminds me of who we really are:

    “Out of this curtain of mist we saw the little tinnie coming towards us, quite fast, and there were two blokes standing in it, shorts and singlets, sunhats on, white zinc cream on their noses, the fishing rod sticking up into the sky,’ he recalled. ‘They waved at us and they come very close, very close and very fast to our boat and one of them raises a stubbie up as if proposing a toast.’ “G’day, mate! He shouted. “Welcome to Australia.”’

Vietnamese food is very yummy, I'm still disappointed that we won't be getting the benefits of Tamil curries any time soon.

[Sheb]

Actually, not yet.  The vote on the legislation is slated for next Monday.  But the bad news is the plan is to backdate the law to 19 July 2013.  Um, yeah, right...  It will probably pass with bipartisan support.

Is that for real? You'd think it be illegal to have such backdating no?