Category Archives: politics

Last Chance to stop the FTA

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The Labor Party is meeting tomorrow to decide to support or not support the Free Trade Agreement with the US.

It is not too late to send a message to Mark Latham to ask him to stop the legislation in the senate. Go to the NoFTA website and send an email to Mark Latham.

Why don’t we need this agreement? See my posts here, here, here, here and here.

But in a few words: No more multi-region DVD players. More money for Disney and other US companies by extending their copyrights. Interference in our pharmaceutical benefits system which will make our drugs more expensive. Ties us closer to the US rather than regional trading partners.

Link

Free Trade Agreement starts to smell

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Crikey.com.au reports on a few articles by key people that criticise the usefulness of the FTA to Australia. Here are some links:

Of course, the US are happy and proud of the agreement, especially gaining access to our pharmaceutical markets, with a yet-to-be-disclosed mechanism allowing US drug companies to appeal about our Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme.

And why is this the first free trade agreement the US has completed with any industrialised nation. Is it because we are the only one stupid enough so far?

At best, the benefits are doubtful. At worst, it will cost us a lot.

It is not too late yet, but we will all regret it if this agree The ALP can still block the enabling legislation for the FTA in the Senate, but they need to Visit nofta.org to send a letter to Mark Latham asking the ALP to not pass the legislation.

Lies, Broken Promises and Looking Backwards

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Everybody seems to be talking about johnhowardlies.com and the site is getting a lot of hits.

The site is worth a look, but it doesn’t quite work for me, for a couple of reasons.

Lies are different to Broken Promises

Firstly, I think that lies and broken promises are different things and ought to be dealt with separately. Now, there is no doubt that John Howard has broken a number of promises. The spectacular one is on the GST:

“There’s no way that a GST will ever be part of our policy. Never ever. It’s dead. It was killed by the voters in the last election.

Any suggestion that I left the door open is absolute nonsense. I didn’t. I never will. The last election killed the GST. It’s not part of our policy and it won’t be part of our policy at any time in the future. ”

John Howard, May 1995

Look at that. Could he be saying a more definite “no” to a GST. But you can’t conclude he was lying in 1995. Just that he broke this promise three years later. It doesn’t encourage me to trust Howard. He knowingly broke his word.

Now, looking to the future, can you expect Howard to keep his promises? I’d say, No. That’s important information.

Not lies, just Broken Promises.

Negative and Looking Backwards

Secondly, johnhowardlies.com makes out it is something like the MoveOn.org movement in the US. Now MoveOn.org has always had, as far as I can see, a relatively positive, forward looking message. They comment on the past, but they are more focussed on a new democratic future.

Johnhowardlies, however is only about John Howard. It doesn’t present an alternative or anything for the future. Once John Howard is gone, what is left? No more community. I get the feeling that creating something like JohnHowardLies just reinforces the need of the left to have a John Howard to hate and poke fun at. And that kind of behaviour helps get him re-elected, because he is necessary in the process. Take the John Howard out of JohnHowardLies and all you have is Lies. Nothing special. Margot Kingston has fallen into the same trap with Not Happy, John.

[Update: I just had a bit more of a read of Not Happy John and I was being a bit unfair. On the Not Happy John home page, Margot is making an appeal for a better political future for Australia and looking for support.]

Positive Future

So, we need some sort of vision for a compassionate, democratic future. We need a MoveOn.org.au. We know we have an unhappy political past. We need a happy, compassionate, honest, real political future.

Am I dreaming here? Do we really need to play everything against Howard? I hope not.

Costello blocks release of tax burden documents

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See this interesting Crikey Article talking about a News Ltd reporter’s attempts to get access to treasury documents on the impact of taxation on ordinary workers under Freedom of Information.

Seems like the Treasurer Peter Costello is frustrating the FoI process, claiming the request “has the potential to lead to confusion and to mislead the public”.

Bogus. Totally Bogus.

election made simple

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The big issue in the upcoming election is this:

Do you want to stay with Howard in the 1950s, or move forwards with Labor, Democrats and Greens into the future.

It is as simple as that. It is as simple as that. It is as simple as that.

Political Party Website Reviews

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It looks like the election is just around the corner. Rumours suggest we are looking at an August 7th or August 14th Election and our federal politicians are working late and long to tidy up before the election.

More than a few voters are going to go to the web to work out who to vote for, so let’s take a look at the official sites of the Liberals, ALP, Democrats and Greens and see what’s what.

Initial Impression

The Liberal site dissapointed immediately. I knew there would be some menus somewhere but browser after browser failed to show anything. I tried Safari, Firefox on Mac and PC, IE on the Mac and finally went to IE6 on a PC in the office and managed to get the menus going along with the tacky applet news ticker (very 1998). There was the expected Australian flag waving in the top left corner and these words “Protecting, Securing, Building Australia’s Future” which sounds eerily like the side of an American police car (“To serve and protect”). I’m going to find this website hard to like.

Next, the ALP site. Very Red, White and Blue. Way over the top with it’s Red,White and Blueness. It works with Safari and Firefox no problems. Australian Flag in the top left also, like the Libs and a total of four appearances of the Southern Cross on the homepage. A bit over done. This site is hard to look at. They need to sort these colours out. That said, the main heading on the page is “Opportunity for All” next to a smiling picture of Latham. That has a good feeling about it. No menus. Has a sidebar down the left and right with a bunch of links. Pretty accessible.

A bit easier on the eye is the Democrats site. Red white and blue are missing, replace with a soft greens and white. No sign of the flag or the southern cross, thankfully. But the banner on the page shows a bunch of dark suited sombre looking democrats with the big heading “The Lie Detectors”. Is this an attempt to look like a TV crime show. Doesn’t work for me. There’s a small, old green and yellow Democrats logo on the right. Looks classic 1980s or something, casting back to their heyday, I guess. In general the site looks clean and there is easy access to current news here and thumbnail images are used well. I’d tend to linger here much longer than either Liberal or ALP.

The Greens site has come a long way. The look is modern and spacious, the least crowded of all the sites. No flags or southern crosses. News stories are well laid out with nice photos for each story. Somebody is putting in a lot of effort to make this site comfortable. Two shades of green and white with the occasional red highlight works well. Nice to see candidates and their photos down the right hand side of the page – but that’s easy if there are only a few of them, I suppose.

So to summarise my initial impressions:

Liberal: broken
ALP: red, white and blue
Democrats: the lie detectors???
Greens: best so far.

The Leader

Next, let’s try and get a feel for leadership of these parties. How do these sites present their leadership? I’m going to count home page appearances and look for defining statements. This is fun.

On the Lib’s home page, there are five John Howards. Mostly dark suits and ties. Oh, look, there a flag behind him in one, and there he is posing with the military, jacket off, all smiles. Now, what does he stand for. Here’s his home page statement:

Australia is the best country in the world.

That is why we must do all in our power to protect, secure and build Australia’s future.

and it has a signature underneath. The whole thing, including a photo, is wrapped up in a business-card-sized image, including the text. Strange.

“Australia is the best country in the world”. Oh, for goodness sake, what a load of old cobblers. He’s going all simple on us. I’m afraid it doesn’t do it for me.

A fresh-faced Mark Latham appears once on the ALP’s home page. Taken from above, it makes him look young and energetic. And I like the aspiring statement right next to it, which take centre stage on the front page (excerpted here):

Opportunity for all

I believe in ambition and aspiration. I believe in the powerful combination of hard work, good family and the civilising role of government services.

I say that economic aspiration is good and social mobility is even better – all Australians climbing the ladder of opportunity.

…

I guess the ALP are taking the risk that people will actually read enough of this to get the idea. It works for me better than the very simple Howard statement, though.

Over in Democrat land, leadership is lower key. Andrew Bartlett leads the ‘lie detector’ pack in the page header, and appears again in the Spotlight section where his National Convention address is referred to. Nothing dramatic or interesting, and I get the feeling that is the way the Democrats like it.

The Greens show three Bob Browns, two Andrew Wilkies (including the cover of his book) and even one John Howard, but he’s only there as Wilkie’s sparring partner for the seat of Bennelong. Several MPs, including Brown have a say in news items on the front page, but there is no leadership statement as such. That is appropriate for the Greens.

My summary:

Liberal: ubiquitous Howard but strangely simple message
ALP: Latham’s youth & aspiration
Democrats: who’s the leader?
Greens: low key

News presentation

I’m interested in getting new direct from the parties as the election nears, so how do these websites provide the news:

The Liberal site links to a bunch of stories from the front page. There are no summaries or photos though. Clicking through leads to boring media release pages with no photos and they are mostly if not all on separate sites. No RSS feeds of news. Why am I not surprised by this.

The ALP shows the latest news below the Latham’s aspirational speech on the home page. Again no summaries or photos. Clicks through lead to press releases, with an MP’s photo if you are lucky, but there are ‘related items’ indicated. Not that exciting really. No RSS newsfeeds either.

Ah, the Democrats get it. A headline item at the top of the page, more stories down the page with photos and good long summaries. I think there must be a content management system behind this one. Following links leads you to standard press releases, but there are still on the site, and you can browse amongst them. No sign of RSS either.

The Greens have gone all the way – using the plone content management system. News is presented in the centre of the main page in big stores with More… links at the bottom. There are well-chosen photos on each story which follow through to the full stories. Easy reading. No RSS.

My summary:

Liberal: boring
ALP: slightly less boring
Democrats: good browsing
Greens: visual, friendly

Subscribing

I want to end up with the news from each party as the campaigns proceed. So, like a true sucker, I’ve signed up to all of the party’s email newsletters. Here I’ll comment on the signup process and the results so far.

The Liberals have a signup field on the home page. Type in an email address, then a click and you are presented with a form asking for your title (defaults to Mr), name and postcode. You can select HTML or text emails then. Clicking ok leads you to a terse page indicating you are on the list, with another form for dobbing in up to five friends. I felt a bit abused by this process. It certainly isn’t up to good web standards. There was no email confirmation step. But they delivered the first bit of news into my email box. Unfortunately it was a nerr-nerr cheap shot negative statement criticising the ALP for not all voting the same way on the FTA, so the content didn’t inspire me. Unsubscribing is easy, which we like.

Over at the ALP, a front page field and a click leads to a page explaining a confirmation email will be sent. Clicking a link in that email leads to a page asking for title and name, but at least the title is optional. Then a click and you are thanked for confirming. No email has come in from the ALP yet, so I can’t comment on that.

You have to register with the Democrats to get email from them. Name, email and postcode are compulsory here, and you end up with a number for a username and they make a password for you (sent via email). But then you get to select what issues and newsletters you are interested in. This is good and flexible, if a bit daunting at first. Within a few hours I’ve had two emails from the Democrats, so they are using this stuff too.

Type in an email address from the Green’s home page and you can get a confirming email which after a reply puts you on an email list. Low-tech and simple. Works. No emails have come in from the Greens yet.

My summary:
Liberals: works. dob in your mates
ALP: standard
Democrats: all the bells and whistles
Greens: simple and functional

——–

Now the summary of summaries:

In terms of websites:

* I’d go Democrats for respect and efficiency
* Greens for friendliness, clean lines and simplicity
* Labor for something temporarily aspirational
* Liberal if I wanted more of the same and had a PC running IE.

Dear reader, I’m writing about websites not party policies. If you want to comment, please don’t flame on about policies of the parties. Let’s talk about their websites here. I’ll get to policies later.

Legalizing Torture (washingtonpost.com)

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The paper trail slowly emerges to support claims that the orders for torture came from the top:

Legalizing Torture (washingtonpost.com):

This week, thanks again to an independent press, we have begun to learn the deeply disturbing truth about the legal opinions that the Pentagon and the Justice Department seek to keep secret. According to copies leaked to several newspapers, they lay out a shocking and immoral set of justifications for torture. In a paper prepared last year under the direction of the Defense Department’s chief counsel, and first disclosed by the Wall Street Journal, the president of the United States was declared empowered to disregard U.S. and international law and order the torture of foreign prisoners. Moreover, interrogators following the president’s orders were declared immune from punishment. Torture itself was narrowly redefined, so that techniques that inflict pain and mental suffering could be deemed legal. All this was done as a prelude to the designation of 24 interrogation methods for foreign prisoners — the same techniques, now in use, that President Bush says are humane but refuses to disclose.

Dinosaurs in Government

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I know I spend a lot of blogspace criticising the current government, but they are such easy targets. After my last post, I wanted to whip off a quick email to Attorney-General Phillip Ruddock to suggest he amend or withdraw the Telecommunications (Interception) Amendment (Stored Communications) Bill 2004.

But a bit of a problem: Ruddock does not have an email address. Yep. No email address. Lots of MPs have them, but Ruddock doesn’t. You can write him a letter or phone him.

So, maybe I can get John Howard to pass on the message. Over to the Prime Minister’s website. Click on the email your PM link and get what? A form to fill in. Oh please. You have to give all sorts of details, and you have to give a street address to get a reply, which will always be by Australia Post.

What is wrong with a normal email address? Aren’t these folks organised enough to provide this basic service? Or are they just not interested in listening to people like me.

Methinks Dinosaurs. Methinks time for change. Look:: M.Latham.MP@aph.gov.au — senator.brown@aph.gov.au

Very Stupid (Secretly and legally read my email) Legislation

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So, you assume your email is reasonably private, right? I do. You’d expect nobody could read your email without a warrant, right? Seems reasonable.

Very Stupid Legislation now before parliament, would allow a whole swag of agencies and individuals secret, legal access to any of your emails, voicemails or SMS messages that are stored awaiting delivery without a warrant in most cases.

Thank goodness we have a sensible Senate that has twice rejected similar silly stuff from the conservative coalition.

This new bill is called the Telecommunications (Interception) Amendment (Stored Communications) Bill 2004

Electronic Frontiers Australia (EFA) is onto it, as usual. They have written a briefing paper laying out the problems with this legislation. From reading this, you’d think this whole bill was a joke. It removes so much protection already in place and grants unprecedented secret access to our email, voicemail and SMS messages.

Here’s how EFA sums it up:

The Telecommunications (Interception) Amendment (Stored Communications) Bill 2004 should be abandoned. The Bill is an utter disgrace. It is the type of legislation one might expect to see in a police state, not in a democracy.

And I agree with them. It would be funny if some folk in the coalition weren’t so serious about passing this bill.

Attorney-General Ruddock: please withdraw this and start again.

Erosion of human rights

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Amnesty International has released it’s 2004 report reflecting on human rights worldwide in 2003:

Huge challenges confronted the international human rights movement in 2003. The UN faced a crisis of legitimacy and credibility because of the US-led war on Iraq and the organization’s inability to hold states to account for gross human rights violations. International human rights standards continued to be flouted in the name of the “war on terror”, resulting in thousands of women and men suffering unlawful detention, unfair trial and torture – often solely because of their ethnic or religious background. Around the world, more than a billion people’s lives were ruined by extreme poverty and social injustice while governments continued to spend freely on arms.

From the section on Australia, which makes interesting, if sobering, reading:

National security was invoked to justify the erosion of human rights safeguards in draft laws on “antiterrorism” measures and refugee rights. Domestic violence against Aboriginal women and children and indefinite detention of child asylum-seekers were prominent themes in the domestic human rights debate.

Ten mistakes re: Iraq

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Here is the transcript of a speech by Gen. Anthony Zinni, USMC (Ret.) where he outlines his view of the mistakes made in the Iraq campaign. He speaks about ten mistakes, which are nicely summarised by Geoff Arnold:

The first mistake that will be recorded in history [was] the belief that containment as a policy doesn’t work. 

The second mistake … is that the strategy was flawed. [...] the road to Baghdad led through Jerusalem.  You solve the Middle East peace process, you’d be surprised what kinds of others things will work out.

The third mistake, I think was one we repeated from Vietnam, we had to create a false rationale for going in to get public support.

We failed in number four, to internationalize the effort.

I think the fifth mistake was that we underestimated the task.

The sixth mistake, and maybe the biggest one, was propping up and trusting the exiles

The seventh problem has been the lack of planning.

The eighth problem was the insufficiency of military forces on the ground.

The ninth problem has been the ad hoc organization we threw in there.

And that ad hoc organization has failed, leading to the tenth mistake, and that’s a series of bad decisions on the ground. 

Zinni’s speech is well worth the read.

(Thanks, Geoff)

Fahrenheit 911 wins Palme d’Or at Canne

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The Guardian reports that Michael Moore’s “Fahrenheit 911″ has won the Palme d’Or at the Canne film festival, and that this might change the world:

This was the year that Cannes flexed its muscles – and France flexed its muscles, too. Michael Moore’s anti-Bush movie Fahrenheit 911 is the first documentary to win the Palme d’Or since Jacques Cousteau’s The Silent World in 1956. The festival hung a garland on Moore for his scathing denunciation of the President’s dubious democratic credentials, the Bush family connections with the Bin Ladens and the diversionary war on Iraq. It was a spectacular rebuke to Republican and corporate America, a stunning exocet of scorn launched from the epicentre of old Europe.

Link

Sunday

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A sleepy old Sunday morning here, sleepily installing Paranoid Android on the macs to avoid any exposure to this nasty exploit.

And then I cycled down to Abbi’s bakery to get a selection of croissant. Cold morning air and vigourous cycling and I still don’t feel awake.

I spent a late night last night reading all there is to read about the Iraqi prisoner abuse stuff, particularly the evidence of links to the highest levels of government. I got stuck reading for hours, article after article. Article after article. I was looking in hope for the seeds of the downfall of Cheney, Bush, Rumsfeld and co, some way out of this Neo Conservative madness.

I found some comfort. There is a real chance that they won’t get away with it and the November election will sweep these ratbags out of office. I really hope so. I want to respect the US again, like I used to. There are so many good people in the US.

New electronic weekly: New Matilda

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Yesterday there was an announcement in the crikey.com.au daily email about a new electronic political weekly called New Matilda.

See the annoucement below, and please register for more information at: www.newmatilda.com.au

I really like the sound of what they stand for:

What we propose

A national, independent electronic political weekly newsletter that will
• Break news that is relevant to a more modern and generous spirited Australia.
• Professionally analyse events and issues. There is so much information, ‘but what does it mean’?
• Innovate policy. We will maintain a steady course on the big policy issues. For example, we will aim to develop a health policy for Australia. We will do this through public discussion in the newsletter.
• Create a constituency of change by nurturing the confidence and convictions of disaffected people, and re-engaging the discouraged,
Why we propose this newsletter

Existing media is predictable and tightly controlled. ‘Spin’ is corrupting public debate. Parochialism and fear are promoted. There is little policy innovation.

There is anger in the community over the leaching away of honesty, decency and ‘loss of soul’. That anger must be tempered with hope and channelled into action.

Electronic technology offers new opportunities. With internet, the centres of power are now less stable.

Our editorial position

Pluralist, liberal and relevant to a modern and more humane Australia.

Public life must be based on enduring values – truth and openness, respect for all, justice, fairness and human flourishing. We will not be value neutral.

Community and personal relationships and social cohesion are critical for a well functioning society.

Prosperity must have a social and moral purpose.

Australians have the right to fully participate in their institutions, eg political parties, business.

The excluded and disadvantaged will have a special place in our activities. Equal opportunity must be linked to personal responsibility.

Our international standing and pursuit of justice and peace depend not just on economic and military strength, but on the values we hold and project.

The response to terrorism must be based on international cooperation, intelligence and security, but also on the factors that provide a breeding ground for terrorism – injustice and poverty.

Who is the newsletter directed to?

People from all parties who feel disenfranchised by existing institutions, political parties and processes. Many are reluctant and disillusioned ALP voters. Others are moderate Liberal voters seeking a more caring response on such issues as reconciliation and refugees. Others again vote Green, Democrat or Independent.

We seek to draw together people with similar values. We will provide an inter-generational forum for new people with new ideas. Many are tired of the sermonising of the Left and the Right.

How we are proceeding

We have established a private company. The board is Hilary McPhee, Bill Gurry, Michael Henry, Rod Cameron, Susie Carleton, Lisa Bowman and John Menadue (Chair). The board has endorsed the business plan.

Supporters include John Button, Elizabeth Evatt, Lowitja O’Donoghue, John Clarke, Morry Schwartz, Robert Manne, Peter Redlich, Ian Macphee, Evan Thornley, Rebecca Huntley, Hugh Mackay, Michael Kelly, Peter Tyson, Graham Freudenberg, Julian Burnside, Stephen Duckett, Julianne Schultz, Eva Cox and Duncan Turpie.

We will shortly be appointing an editor, assistant editor (policy development) and business manager. A number of contributing editors will be appointed.

We will shortly issue an invitation to subscribe/donate. The estimated operating cost in the first full year is $380,000. We will initially raise $250,000 in shares and donations. We have pledges to date of over $220,000.

Our subscription target at the end of the second year, is 7,500 @ $50 per annum ($375,000). We will be seeking bulk subscriptions from government agencies, unions, corporations and professional firms. We plan to launch in July/August 2004.

www.newmatilda.com.au has been set up to register initial interest. We aim to have 2,500 on the register before launch. Will you help by registering your name. Could you also copy this email to interested friends.

Contact

New Matilda Pty Ltd, PO box 1025, Surry Hills, NSW, 2010

Donations: New Matilda Pty Ltd, Acct No.10152919, Commonwealth Bank, BSB 062258.

John.menadue [at] newmatilda.com.au

John Menadue

Chair 19 May 2004

Punishing the 92% to catch the 8%

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It turns out that over 92% of the people detained as illegal immigrants to Australia end up being accepted as genuine refugees.

So we lock up the 92% for years in some cases, in prison conditions, in order to catch out the 8% and provide some sort of deterrent to people coming here as fake refugees.

Surely, with our high level of civilisation, we can work out some better deterrent than this. Punishing the huge majority of genuine refugees that have already suffered an awful lot.

And some of the 92% are children.

The Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission has just released their National Inquiry into Children in Immigration Detention Report – A Last Resort? To quote from the news release:

In its National Inquiry into Children in Immigration Detention Report- A Last Resort?, tabled in Federal Parliament today [May 13th], the Commission found Australia’s immigration detention policy has failed to protect the mental health of children, failed to provide adequate health care and education and failed to protect unaccompanied children and those with disabilities.

The two-year, comprehensive Inquiry also found that the mandatory detention system breached the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. It failed, as required by the Convention, to make detention a measure of “last resort”, for the “shortest appropriate period of time” and subject to independent review.

The system failed to make the “best interests of the child” a primary consideration in detaining them and it failed to treat them with humanity and respect.

Furthermore, the Government’s failure to implement repeated recommendations by mental health professionals to remove children with their parents from detention amounted to “cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment”.

Cruel, inhumane and degrading treatment. Why is this happening in my country. Does this make you sad and angry, like it does me?

To do something about it, have a look at: A Just Australia or Amnesty International Australia.