Category: General news

Tim Anderson looks at Syria, the attacks on Wikileaks and the Sydney Morning Herald.

The Sydney Morning Herald has dutifully joined in with the international chorus of protest over a delegation of Australians that has gone to Syria on a fact finding and solidarity tour. See: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/wikileaks-party-defends-its-cup-of-tea-with-bashar-alassad-20131231-304ne.html

Herald journalists Leesha McKenny and David Wroe do the profession no honour in producing their dirt sheet on the delegation’s visit that spins all the same old lies and insinuations and includes the gratuitous comment that one of the participants in the delegation was Dr “Tim Anderson – who was acquitted of the 1978 bombing of the Sydney Hilton hotel”. Well, if he was acquitted of an event that occurred more than 35 years ago why bring it up in this context, other than to imply that even though he was acquitted he was somehow guilty, or the crime somehow reflects on the nature of the man, even though he was found not to be guilty of the crime?

Likewise the key person the delegation met with, according to the authors, is “accused war criminal President Bashar al-Assad.” This claim, frequently made by those prosecuting the war against Syria, should be treated with caution by any journalist who claims to write objectively. Like the Anderson insinuation, here it is used merely to colour the article. In the absence of any substantial evidence to back the claim (as opposed to the mountains of evidence from the ‘rebel’ forces of their own war crimes), it is a mere reiteration that Assad and the Syrian government are the instigators of the war in Syria, and the chief perpetrators of crimes within the course of that war.

This demonstrates above all what tools these journalists are, given the mountains of evidence that the violence in Syria has been instigated from outside and is the result of a well prepared proxy war. This following Washington Post article, ironically enough the result of a Wikileak in early 2011 should make that clear. See: http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/us-secretly-backed-syrian-opposition-groups-cables-released-by-wikileaks-show/2011/04/14/AF1p9hwD_story.html

Also – the whole world – except the mainstream media and the politicians apparently – knows of this article from Seymour Hersh in the New Yorker in 2005, that revealed the making of an insidious alliance between US and Saudi governments to reshape the Middle East, which included the targeting of Syria, as an ally of Shia Iran. See: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2007/03/05/070305fa_fact_hersh

The insidiousness of the journalists’ unsubstantiated, or actually falsified claims is demonstrated in the smear that the “Assad regime, … among other alleged atrocities is accused of using chemical weapons against its own people.” Once against, the journalists use an accusation to imply a truth. Conveniently, by ignoring the actual results of enquiries into the allegations, they do not have to deal with evidence that the US administration tried to use concocted charges against the Syrian government of chemical warfare against its own people to launch a military strike against Syria – what would have been another of what history shows to be many war crimes committed by the United States to defend and extend its empire. By avoiding the facts, or declining to actually investigate, the journalists and their employer continue to be a part of the conspiracy to smother the truth and parrot propaganda when it comes to Syria.

Simply the allegations that the Syrian government was the instigator of chemical warfare in Ghouta and other places has fallen apart, as revealed, among others, by Seymour Hersh in the London Review of Books. See: http://www.lrb.co.uk/v35/n24/seymour-m-hersh/whose-sarin

His article has been studiously ignored by the US and Australian media, because it interferes with the narrative they are peddling. They have also ignored the findings of the UN Commission that investigated the attacks, which effectively dismantled the case against the Assad government. See: http://consortiumnews.com/2013/12/23/un-investigator-undercuts-nyt-on-syria/

The writers of the SMH article also trimmed the comments made by the Abbott Government’s Foreign Minister, Julie Bishop. The only reason for this could be the level of double think in her statement was too preposterous to reveal, if the dirt sheet was to retain any plausibility. Bishop is reported in the article to have ‘expressed anger’ saying the visit was “exceedingly counterproductive” and ”reckless”, adding that ”Assad has been accused of war crimes … It was exceedingly counterproductive of an Australian political party to meet the Syrian leader given the volatile conflict that is under way … This was a reckless action to take.”

What is not reported is her comment that: “It is not in support of the sanctions regime that Australia has in place, in fact it risks undermining the sanctions regime we have in place, and it risks aligning Australia with one side of the conflict in Syria, which is something we would not do.” See: http://news.yahoo.com/wikileaks-party-meeting-syrian-president-222339893–spt.html

How on earth do Australian governments impose sanctions on Syria – and close down the Syrian embassy – and join the predatory “Friends of Syria” that supports the US created “Syrian government in exile” and is already planning for the lucrative ‘post-Assad’ reconstruction of Syria, and consider themselves to not be taking sides? It is this “neutral” stance demonstrated by Australian governments that these journalists and the mainstream media generally are rock solid in supporting. It puts them firmly within the camp of those criminally conspiring to destroy Syria as part of a plan to re-order the Middle East in favour of imperialism and the most reactionary social forces imaginable.

And by the way – it makes a mockery of the Sydney Morning Herald’s motto – “Independent, Always”

sources:
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/wikileaks-party-defends-its-cup-of-tea-with-bashar-alassad-20131231-304ne.html
https://www.facebook.com/wayne.sonter.7/posts/10152180014204391

 

 

Twighlight Markets and Joynt regular Karl S Williams is taking Woodford by storm. With at least one gig every day the West End troubadour has turned heads with his gutsy passion, huge vocal register and eclectic material.

Diners at the Pineapple Bar last night postponed their departure as Williams slipped seamlessly from piano ballads to dark banjo pieces that gave a new dimension to that generally underdeveloped instrument.
Sound techs are raving about the clean, spare sound that mixes swamp, remote hilltop and Hootanany back block with Williams’ Brisbane Southside roots.
Williams is not the only local turning heads at Westend’s cultural summer sojourn. Joe Hallestein of community hub Turnstyle presented his rousing talk on windmills, Jo Sri from Rivermouth is in the running for a free ticket to next year’s Woodford as a “walk up” to the Poet’s Breakfast. Rivermouth itself has been rocking the after midnight crowd at the Joy Luck Club. Of course, there is lots going on from places other than West End but that is not our concern, is it?

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Nova Heart wants to push things forward. Do something different. Avoid what has become the norm for Chinese popular music. Being validated through association of a major brand and western culture. Instead they want to make it by doing their own thing and pushing things forward.

They have toured five continents before publishing their debut album. A feat very few bands can brag about.

Helen Feng Nova Heart, vocals] told me, as we were standing outside in the rain at Woodford Folk Festival, that this has been made possible thanks to their Fake Music Media manager Philipp Grefer’s hard work.

Fake Music Media’s name is a play on the assumption that everything that originates from China is fake.

When it comes to music, regarding both China and South Korea, the music industry often focuses on who an artist has played for or is associated with. This is used as a way to validate their popularity.

If an artist plays at a store for a certain brand, then the band is popular — not because the artist has something interesting or revolutionary to say.

“The music industry stopped being relevant when it became an industry.”

She explains to me that this is because of hipsterism. Certain bands are cool because they are sold as cool, and if you listen to that band you are cool. Also, you have to wear a certain type of clothing, because you need to show you are cool and hip.

Hipsterism is nothing more than post-materialism.

“Everybody is reading the same stupid Pitchfork reviews and doing the same stupid hipster shit.”

To avoid this Nova Heart has had to make it big outside of China first — while also trying to push things forward. Something that can either be extremely successful or a complete failure.

“I am scared.”

She tells me that as a musician you often spend 90% of your time on the road. This makes it hard to have an interesting life. Therefore musicians are not really that interesting people — which results in most music being not very interesting.

“Am I a complete a**hole saying that?”

If your life is different from everyone else, only then it is easy to be interesting.

To start a revolution with music, you must have something interesting to say, she explains. Music is just sound, not a revolution on its own — something people need to get over and understand. Have a reason for what you are doing.

“That is bigger than being famous.”

As we part our way I am left questioning not only the music industry, but also what we easily label as popular music. Is it really interesting, does it have any reason and why is a certain band popular?

She did touch upon that during our conversation, when she said that we have become too focused on being happy and that everything is fine. If your are negative or critical of something, then you are the problem.

Let us just pretend that everything is great and ignore what can and should be changed, right?

Interestingly enough, I am also left with the notion that there is hope for music. As long as we have more artists like Helen Feng that are daring enough to criticise the industry and willing to risk everything for the sake of changing it.

On their Australia Tour Nova Heart will be in playing at two venues in Brisbane. Check them out if you are looking for something different and a band that wants to make a difference.

http://youtu.be/NDcip9JtwtU

Nova Heart Australian Tour 2014
Thursday 2nd January 2014 @ Ric’s Bar – Brisbane (QLD)
Friday 3rd January 2014 @ Old Museum – Brisbane (QLD
Saturday 4th January 2014 @ Great Northern – Byron Bay (NSW)
Thursday 9th January 2014 @ The Brass Monkey – Cronulla (NSW)
Friday 10th January 2014 @ Spectrum – Sydney (NSW)
Saturday 11th January 2014 @ The Standard – Sydney (NSW)
Wednesday 15th January 2014 @ Beach Road Hotel – Bondi (NSW)
Thursday 16th January 2014 @ Ding Dong Lounge – Melbourne (VIC)

Greens at Woodford came together yesterday in a climax of hilarity at the Great Green Debate. Proceedings commenced with the prolific, clever and hilarious Ben Law listing the horrors of Abbot’s first 100 days In government. In a wry aside, “you have to admire their efficiency”. Professor Ian Lowe followed with a rousing douse of realism culminating in a passionate song about climate change (to the tune of Waltzing Matilda). The surprises continued. Comedian Rod Quantock broke every rule in the debating rule book by changing sides mid-debate, pregnant ex-politician, Kate Jones, settled for breaking one of the fundamental rules by turning really personal and nasty, all to the full throated laughter of around 1200 patrons.

Given that the topic of the debate was that every cloud has a silver lining, there was plenty of material  in the  current political environments to draw on. West End identity and the longest serving environmental lawyer in the EDO, Jo Bragg valiantly attempted to find the silver lining in the defunding of the organisation in which she has spent most of her professional life.

The debate followed neatly from a stirring bout of activism at the Blue King Brown concert where fists were raised in unison over the plight of the West Papua subjects of a murderous Indonesia Sian regime. Other patrons had prepared themselves a the more theoretical Green Tent where Get Up guru, Simon Sheik, reflected on activism vs politics.
The confluence of entertainment and politics left everyone in no doubt that Woodford itself is the inspiring proof that a better life is possible. The opportunity for the Tribe to gather well out of the influence of the Murdoch Press and everything it represents and have a good belly laugh at our own expense is invaluable.
The natural crossover between West End and Woodford is evident in the number of locals on the ground. Expect further postings.

This page has been posted here because the original has been hacked – http://phys.org/news/2013-12-koch-brothers-reveals-funders-climate.html

Dr. Robert J. Brulle is a professor of sociology and environmental science at Drexel University in Philadelphia. Credit: CASBS

A new study conducted by Drexel University’s environmental sociologist Robert J. Brulle, PhD, exposes the organizational underpinnings and funding behind the powerful climate change countermovement. This study marks the first peer-reviewed, comprehensive analysis ever conducted of the sources of funding that maintain the denial effort.

Through an analysis of the financial structure of the organizations that constitute the core of the countermovement and their sources of monetary support, Brulle found that, while the largest and most consistent funders behind the countermovement are a number of well-known conservative foundations, the majority of donations are “dark money,” or concealed funding.

The data also indicates that Koch Industries and ExxonMobil, two of the largest supporters of climate science denial, have recently pulled back from publicly funding countermovement organizations. Coinciding with the decline in traceable funding, the amount of funding given to countermovement organizations through third party pass-through foundations like Donors Trust and Donors Capital, whose funders cannot be traced, has risen dramatically.

Brulle, a professor of sociology and environmental science in Drexel’s College of Arts and Sciences, conducted the study during a year-long fellowship at Stanford University’s Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences. The study was published today in Climatic Change, one of the top 10 climate science journals in the world.

The climate change countermovement is a well-funded and organized effort to undermine public faith in climate science and block action by the U.S. government to regulate emissions. This countermovement involves a large number of organizations, including conservative think tanks, advocacy groups, trade associations and conservative foundations, with strong links to sympathetic media outlets and conservative politicians.

“The climate change countermovement has had a real political and ecological impact on the failure of the world to act on the issue of global warming,” said Brulle. “Like a play on Broadway, the countermovement has stars in the spotlight – often prominent contrarian scientists or conservative politicians – but behind the stars is an organizational structure of directors, script writers and producers, in the form of conservative foundations. If you want to understand what’s driving this movement, you have to look at what’s going on behind the scenes.”

To uncover how the countermovement was built and maintained, Brulle developed a listing of 118 important climate denial organizations in the U.S. He then coded data on philanthropic funding for each organization, combining information from the Foundation Center with financial data submitted by organizations to the Internal Revenue Service. The final sample for analysis consisted of 140 foundations making 5,299 grants totaling $558 million to 91 organizations from 2003 to 2010.

Key findings include:

• Conservative foundations have bank-rolled denial. The largest and most consistent funders of organizations orchestrating climate change denial are a number of well-known conservative foundations, such as the Searle Freedom Trust, the John William Pope Foundation, the Howard Charitable Foundation and the Sarah Scaife Foundation. These foundations promote ultra-free-market ideas in many realms.
• Koch and ExxonMobil have recently pulled back from publicly visible funding. From 2003 to 2007, the Koch Affiliated Foundations and the ExxonMobil Foundation were heavily involved in funding climate-change denial organizations. But since 2008, they are no longer making publicly traceable contributions.
• Funding has shifted to pass through untraceable sources. Coinciding with the decline in traceable funding, the amount of funding given to denial organizations by the Donors Trust has risen dramatically. Donors Trust is a donor-directed foundation whose funders cannot be traced. This one foundation now provides about 25% of all traceable foundation funding used by organizations engaged in promoting systematic denial of climate change.
• Most funding for denial efforts is untraceable. Despite extensive data compilation and analyses, only a fraction of the hundreds of millions in contributions to climate change denying organizations can be specifically accounted for from public records. Approximately 75% of the income of these organizations comes from unidentifiable sources.

“The real issue here is one of democracy. Without a free flow of accurate information, democratic politics and government accountability become impossible,” said Brulle. “Money amplifies certain voices above others and, in effect, gives them a megaphone in the public square. Powerful funders are supporting the campaign to deny scientific findings about global warming and raise public doubts about the roots and remedies of this massive global threat. At the very least, American voters deserve to know who is behind these efforts.”

This study is part one of a three-part project by Brulle to examine the climate movement in the U.S. at the national level. The next step in the project is to examine the environmental movement or the climate change movement. Brulle will then compare the whole funding flow to the entire range of organizations on both sides of the debate.

Following candidates around my electorate has proven a hit and miss affair at the same time as everyone’s getting ready for Christmas.

Aware that she would be rallying the troops last weekend, I kept missing Terri Butler, but it was not hard to spot her supporters in their red t-shirts, emblazoned with ‘Labor and Local’.

The slogan might be an indicator of how Butler is pitching her campaign, although I suspect it was more an opportunity to familiarise the electorate with her image rather than with her policy positions.

Some supporters were happy to pose, others were not so keen, but, as you would expect, all were optimistic about their new candidate and her chances of winning.

Bill Glasson and his LNP supporters, who have been very active over the past couple of weekends, must have decided to take a break so close to Christmas, since there was no sign of them on the streets at all.

Geoff Ebbs put out a late call to his Greens supporters to join him on Sunday morning at the Boggo Road Ecosciences Centre in Dutton Park. Ebbs had chosen the Ecosciences Centre, he said, to protest the Abbott Government’s cuts to science and education funding.

Being an eager citizen journalist, I turned up early, but there was not a Green t-shirt to be seen!

He was planning similar stops later on the day at Griffith University and the ABC, both based in the electorate on Brisbane’s South Bank, so hopefully he got a better turnout for those events.

Engagement with the electorate via social media can be fraught with danger for candidates, as I think Glasson may have learned recently.

Glasson is not a user of Twitter, but he does have a very active Facebook page. In a curious move last week, he invited his Facebook followers to comment on Treasurer Hockey’s controversial and polarising Mid Year Economic and Fiscal Outlook statement, and was later compelled to post: “Good to see some hearty debate – please remember to always be respectful and never resort to personal attacks. Offending users will be banned.”

It’s hard to know whether the comments still listed on his site are a mere selection of what had been provided. While freedom of speech is championed by the Coalition, apparently there is a need to impose limits, even for them.

It seems that Butler, Ebbs and Glasson are still in the process of working out how they will tackle this campaign.

Labor and the Greens are already focussing on what many consider has been a poor start for Tony Abbott and his new government. They are taking aim at the impacts of the Government’s funding decisions on education and other services.

In the coming weeks, Bill Glasson will have to assess how much traction these issues have gained with local voters, and decide whether to align himself with, or distance himself from, his Federal leader. It will be revealing to see whether Tony Abbott will be invited up north to support his candidate in the coming month.

At this stage there is no talk of a candidates’ forum, as occurred on a limited basis in September.

As for the other parties, the Katter Australia Party remains silent on whether it will field a candidate.

Stable Population, which has lodged an application with the Australian Electoral Commission to change its name to the “Sustainable Population Party”, put out a call to its Queensland supporters to suggest potential high profile candidates for the Griffith by-election. They admit, however, that time not on their side.

There’s not much use in shaking our pressies in Griffith – it’s too early to tell exactly what’s inside.

– See more at: http://nofibs.com.au/2013/12/23/shaking-pressies-griffith-election-christmas-wrap-griffithelects/#sthash.U96UPKLu.dpuf