1 February 2012 - click here for index of articles
Car industry – battle for Australian manufacturing
The press’ business pages are full of predictions that Ford, GMH and Toyota will take their Australian car making operations offshore. Almost every columnist is taking a dry economist’s attitude to the prospect – that it’s inevitable and that governments should stop supporting the industry. The Opposition agrees. Speculation has been prompted by sackings at Toyota and a lack of commitment from Ford or Holden to produce vehicles in Australia when current models end their cycle. The jobs of 50,000 workers employed in the car industry hang in the balance along with the future of Australia as a country where people “make things”, to borrow a phrase from former PM Kevin Rudd. more ...
Editorial – Needed: a new system
The Great Transformation: Shaping New Models was the theme of the World Economic Forum (WEF) held in Davos from January 25-29. The reference is to “new” models of capitalism. The “Arab Spring” protests demanding democratic rights and social justice, the Occupy Movement in the US and the millions of people across Europe who have taken to the streets are worrying governments and big business. People around the world are demanding jobs, social justice, democratic rights, and some are even questioning the system of capitalism. Inside the exclusive Swiss ski resort, 2,600 business and government leaders, academics and “safe” (not going to question the capitalist system itself) trade union and NGO leaders rubbed shoulders. more ...
Speaking out for the disenfranchised
January 2012 saw the arrival of Immortal Technique for his first ever Australia and New Zealand tour. Immortal Technique is a Harlem based Hip Hop artist of African-Peruvian descent. He is well known for his political lyrics and activism that are deeply critical of, for example, US imperialism. more ...
Back to the bad old days for Abbott
Federal Liberal leader Tony Abbott loves old fashioned political “solutions”. Last week he provoked anger when he declared, with reference to Canberra’s Aboriginal tent embassy that things should “move on”. more ...
Struggle and working class history
“Should workers struggle?” was the theme of a meeting of trade union and Communist Party activists held in Sydney towards the end of 2011. The following article is the contribution to the meeting by MALCOLM TULLOCH, NSW state secretary of the Construction and General Division of the CFMEU. more ...
Don’t trade away health
The Australian government is negotiating a Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPPA) free trade agreement with the US, New Zealand, Chile, Peru, Brunei, Singapore, Malaysia and Vietnam. more ...
The world war on democracy
Lisette Talate died the other day. I remember a wiry, fiercely intelligent woman who masked her grief with a determination that was a presence. She was the embodiment of people’s resistance to the war on democracy. I first glimpsed her in a 1950s Colonial Office film about the Chagos Islanders, a tiny creole nation living midway between Africa and Asia in the Indian Ocean. The camera panned across thriving villages, a church, a school, a hospital, set in a phenomenon of natural beauty and peace. Lisette remembers the producer saying to her and her teenage friends, “Keep smiling girls!”. more ...
CC Secretariat statement – Bringing war to our doorstep – US “pivots” to Asia, Pacific and Indian Ocean
“The United States is a Pacific power, and we are here to stay,” said US President Obama during his visit to Australia late last year as he announced the stationing of 2,500 US Marines in Darwin, more visits by US ships and aircraft to Australia, greater US access to Australian military bases, more joint military exercises, and storage of more US military equipment in Australia. Then on January 5 at the Pentagon, President Obama formally announced a new US policy which will bring war to Australia’s doorstep. more ...
Culture & Life – Hurrah for a free press!
Were you as surprised as I was by the full page ad that appeared in The Sydney Morning Herald on Friday January 6? This pretentious page of self-adulation contained few words, but left you gobsmacked none the less. more ...
Over 9 years worth of sharp humour from The Guardian's very own cartoonist Pete Andrew can be accessed from the main menu – or just click here.
Chaser – Qantas “Still Call Australia Home” Spoof
Australian Mining – “This is the real story”
Check out this satire of the mining advertisement that ran on Australian television.
My Water’s On Fire Tonight (The Fracking Song)
Corporation representatives have admitted that fracking fluids penetrate aquifers, but they claim that pressure injection occurs at great depths, so water extracted for drinking and agriculture from aquifers at higher levels is unaffected. However, many cases of ruined water supplies in Australia, Canada and the United States have disproved this. In some towns near CSG mining sites piped water can even be set alight because of the presence of methane and fracking chemicals.
The cost of the war for Australia:
This brings to 33 Australians killed (32 with the Australian Defence Force and one with the British Armed Forces), 212 wounded.
900 soldiers have been compensated as a result of their service in Afghanistan for injuries sustained in that country; the listed injuries were injuries relating to psychological and physical harm. A cost that is ongoing.
Australia has spent $10 bill on the war in Afghanistan, the cost goes up by $110 million per month. This money could have been spent on more socially useful needs.
In 2011, 1500 Afghan civilians have lost their life an increase of 15% on 2010.
In October and November 2011 3 Australian soldiers have been killed and 10 wounded by Afghan army personnel in 2 separate incidents.
Commenting on the recent death of 3 Australian soldiers in Afghanistan Mike Carlton expressed a sentiment we would all agree with: “How many more young Diggers must lose their lives, how many Australian homes must know aching sorrow, before we recognize that we have no place in this dirty, unwinnable Afghan War. (SMH 5-6/11/2011)
(Details updated 16/11/2011.)
Bring the troops home now.
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Wednesday, February 1, 2012
