January 23, 2019 - click here for index of articles.

River crisis – Indigenous leaders call for change

Aboriginal leaders have joined the Greens in calling for a royal commission into the crisis facing the Murray Darling river system. Around a million fish are estimated to have died in a massive fish kill along a stretch of the Lower Darling River in NSW, just weeks after another 10,000 died in a separate incident. more ...

Editorial – Corporate greed responsible for death of rivers

The loss of huge numbers of fish in the Murray-Darling River system was due to the death of blue-green algae, which breeds in slow-flowing or stagnant rivers containing run-off agricultural fertiliser. Wildlife species are also dying as their habitat decays. more ...

Hostile act

Declaration of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Cuba: On January 16, 2019, the US State Department announced the decision to suspend for only 45 days the application of Title III of the Helms-Burton Act, “in order to conduct a careful review ... in light of US national interests and efforts to accelerate a transition to democracy in Cuba, and to include such elements as the regime’s brutal oppression of human rights and fundamental freedoms and its inexcusable support for the increasingly authoritarian and corrupt regimes of Venezuela and Nicaragua”. more ...

A celebration of the life of Bonita Mabo

Ernestine “Bonita” Mabo was a small woman who became a giant of Australia’s Indigenous land rights and reconciliation movements. Dr Mabo was remembered as the mother of native title as well as a loving mother and grandmother at her state funeral last December 8. more ...

The working class and its allies

The 20th International Meeting of Communist and Workers’ Parties (IMCWP) took place on November 23-25, 2018, in Athens, hosted by the KKE (Communist Party of Greece), which celebrated the 100th year of its historic course. more ...

Book Review – Underwater Australia by Darren Jew

Life on Earth began in the seas. The variety of life in the oceans outdoes that on land and in the air combined. But ocean species are just as vulnerable as land based ones. And heaven knows, we’ve exterminated enough of the latter since humans learned how to apply machinery and explosives to the business of killing animals for sport and clearing land and forest for commercial gain. more ...

Registering Israel’s lobbyists

Depending on what criteria one uses, there are between 200 and 600 groups in the United States that wholly or in part are dedicated to furthering the interests of Israel. The organisations are both Jewish, like the Zionist Organisation of America, and Christian Zionist to include John Hagee’s Christians United for Israel, but the funding of the Israel Lobby and both its political and media access comes overwhelmingly from Jewish supporters and advocates. more ...

China can’t save the world from climate change by itself

With all the problems in the world – trade tensions, political instability, traffic – it’s easy to forget about the mother of all threats, climate change. Sure, other grievances can seem insurmountable, but it’s unlikely any [nuclear conflagration aside] of those carry the potential to wipe out humanity as we know it. more ...

Brexit

Chaos everywhere, consensus nowhere has and continues to define Britain’s stalling and tortuous attempt to depart the EU in an orderly fashion. Such chaos should come as no surprise, however, because more than a harbinger of Britain’s departure from the EU, Brexit is a harbinger of the break-up of the UK. more ...

Ellen Perlo – Advocate for equality, peace, justice and socialism

When, as a student, she walked on the campus of the University of Wisconsin in the 1930s even her best friend didn’t want to be seen with her. That was because Ellen Perlo often walked and talked with SI Hayakawa, a linguist who was, at that time, a young teacher at the university. more ...

The fight of our lives

You could be forgiven for thinking that Brexit is the only thing going on in Britain right now, but the political climate is not the only climate in turmoil. Behind the media headlines, the global climate system is changing and, for each year that this continues unabated, the odds for humanity stack up further. more ...

Quote of the Week

“The environment” refers to the totality of social and physical conditions as they affect nature (land, water, air, plants and animals) and humanity with particular reference to their influence on the growth, development and survival of organisms, either across a limited area or the Earth as a whole. “Sustainability” refers to the ability of an ecosystem to hold, endure or bear the weight of social and natural forces which could compromise its healthy operation.

Tim Delaney, Philosophy Now

This web page was last updated: Wednesday, January 23, 2019.