spin

There is no good solution to the Afghan dilemma that US President Joe Biden inherited from his predecessors. As one of his last acts in office Donald Trump had already announced that he intended to withdraw all US troops from Afghanistan. And his predecessor Barack Obama missed the opportunity to prepare the withdrawal with the valid argument that the invasion had actually become obsolete after Osama bin Laden's death.

pentagone

On Sunday, the Taliban movement asserted that it had established control over all districts of the Afghan capital city of Kabul, as Afghan President Ashraf Ghani fled the country. Western countries, including the US, are evacuating diplomatic personnel from Kabul.

holidays

For departing to the Camp David presidential retreat for a weekend vacation in the middle of several internal and foreign crises that the United States is facing, President Joe Biden has received an unflattering nickname from the conservative critics - "commander-in-absence".

intransigence...

Intransigence is experienced by many of us daily. It may even dominate our own emotional repertoire. Now, though, as NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian announces rising Covid infections and accumulating deaths, this unhelpful trait seems increasingly endangering.

AI

Are you scared yet, human?

This Panorama/4C program looks at the problems of Artificial Intelligence (https://iview.abc.net.au/video/NC2103H026S00) … We have done our best here to follow the AI caper since the inception of this site (2005)... If you live outside Australia, your link might be different: 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000wft2/sign/panorama-are-you-scared-yet-human

con

The technology roadmap sketched by Morrison and Taylor is a con. It is in fact a statement of support for the fossil fuel industry which is heavily subsidised by and a significant donor to the Liberal and National Parties.

turnkey

Though Assange isn't in a US prison, his detention in the UK is TOTALLY illegal. The English crown and all its fucking members should be ashamed about its justice system. The Magna Carta has long been flushed down a dirty toilet on behalf of the Americans — especially their hypocritical Catholic president.

seat of power

Thousands of pages of the Queen’s secret letters to governors-general from Lord Casey to Sir William Deane, from 1965-2001, will soon be open to the public in the most significant release of royal documents since Sir John Kerr’s explosive ‘Palace letters’.

approval

Senate Passes $1 Trillion Infrastructure Bill, Handing Biden a Bipartisan Win

The approval came after months of negotiations and despite deficit concerns, reflecting an appetite in both parties for the long-awaited spending package.

q+a

Last night on Q+A, (ABC TV 12/08/2021) Matt Cavanan excelled himself. We could go in detail in regard to his idiotic deliberate ignorance for which in a few years' time we can only guess he will apologise profusely. He is a "National". It's an Australian political party representing farmers, miners, cowboys, cows, camels and loonies. These people know something that we don't: climate change is not happening in Queensland (though it seems to be happening everywhere else on earth).

nat parks

"Nothing dollarable is safe, however guarded” wrote the great American conservationist and protected area crusader, John Muir in 1909. He was right then, and he’s still right today: maybe more than ever. 

Current proposals for development in Kosciuszko National Park are a case in point, and they employ what is becoming a trademark method of attacking NSW national parks. It’s about imposing the culture of money on the carefully developed culture of nature conservation for the public good: a culture for which the great Kosciuszko National Park was once a world leader.

mercenaries

The French had their famous Foreign Legion… But these soldiers of fortune were not true mercenaries. 

Mercenaries are primarily concerned with making money at the expense of ethics — including professional soldiers hired to serve in a foreign army.

The Egyptians, the Romans employed mercenaries… Often the work of the mercenaries is “opaque” not so much on the results, but on who pays them and for what purpose. 

freedom...

Nationals MP George Christensen will move from politician to publisher, launching a “pro-freedom” news website as he prepares to retire from federal Parliament.

The website, modelled on American outlet The Drudge Report, has so far been filled with links to fringe blogs and stories that are critical of COVID mask mandates and vaccinations.

One story claims a spate of US mass shootings were a “ruse” that were “co-ordinated by some evil force”.

uni-

It is now unambiguously clear that certain influential centres of government advice and government policy hold the university-as-institution in contempt.