CRUNCHING SOME NUMBERS (at last)

In a couple of my opinions I expressed in discussions about what we should or not do, I alluded to being reasonable or not... All this to do with the psychological warfare we need to create. A counter-action to the lies that are dished out everyday by our government (and peddle by others if you wish).

Crickey.com manages to do it a bit but, even there, it’s still in “limbo-land�? as far as turning the necessary number of minds around... “Preaching to the converted�? is not a bad thing as it reinforces the faith but one still needs to go our there and do some door to door salesmanship...
and be prepared to be thrown out...

The laws of averages are quite simple. If we do not have “half plus one�? we do not control the space we live in. We can make noises, jump up and down, the rule of law in a democracy is that the majority wins and can dictate whatever it wishes... It’s the way with companies including Telstra presently structured so the government is still the owner of the telco until the majority decides otherwise.

It’s thus paramount that we should try to influence some senators (company directors) to hold conscience votes rather that vote along “party lines�? on everything. And encourage all the parties who oppose to do what they are supposed to do: oppose...

The dome of conscience is a fantastic idea but it’s still not out there in general public-land... And we all know how a “rock-solid policy guarantee�? can become sand between the fingers “when circumstances change�?...

And the media is not going to make a song and dance about conscience votes except when there’s a sexy issue from which proprietors can make more money and to which the result is more or less known in advance, while bathing in “morality�?. They’re waiting in glee for even the most teeny weeny changes to the media ownership laws...

Though these laws did not change in the US as congress still does not trust the “new Yank�? Mr Murdoch, in Australia, Johnnee has already hinted to just a few tweaks in this area...

On the last Andrew Ollie lecture (check the transcripts), John Anderson, a former journalist who has climbed the corporate ladder was talking — as well as glowingly spruiking the great independence of the media — about joining forces to save money... For example a crew of Channel Ten could do a job somewhere while a crew of Channel Seven covered another story somewhere else and the same for Channel Nine in another location... Then they would pool the vision and the reportage...

Moral here? Same coverage on the commercial box everywhere including cable... and three-quarters of the work force in this area becoming either freelance with all the uncertainty attached and obligatory pay cuts or joining the ranks of street-cleaners working for the dole...

Unified anaesthetic for the populace... We’d become like Homer Simpson if we’re not there yet... That stupid, lazy good-for-nothing character with very few redeeming features is now the “hero�? of about 60 per cent of viewers who empathise with this sloth because it glorifies the easy solution of enjoying life with the minimum of effort. It shows the lazy bums-out-there that they’re not that bad after all... It’s very pervasive and like Berthold Brecht, I believe the subtle message is misunderstood despite the intent to the contrary... because most people are unable to READ BETWEEN THE LINES...

In “spruiking the independence�? of the media John Anderson thus said without laughing that proprietors never interfered with the content of their papers or TV news and editorials...

Just a few days before, Rupert Murdoch had directly intervened in an editorial of the times, which was slightly critical of My Blair, to turn it around into a superbly glowing piece... This info came directly from the editor-in-chief...

Praise the General Manager of the ABC who responded with the required polite thanks to the speech, but bollocks to its content...

From “July One�?, the government will have a senate majority as well as the house of reps, and the rest of us who oppose all the Howard government tricks and furphies will be stranded on a desert island...

@ More than ever we will need direct action.
@ More than ever we will need to prick the media
@ More than ever we will need to be reasonable in our knowledge and steadfast in our beliefs but we will need to be totally unreasonable in our tactics...
We’ll have to perform miracles...
walk on water so to speak...

Some bloggers suggest here that we should also attack the opposition in order to show some fairness in our comments... I can understand their concerns... But why not shoot ourselves in the foot in the process too? The alternative to the presently weak opposition is the Democrats and the Greens and it will take 50 years before the Greens muster the numbers to win government. The Democrats will never get there...

On top of that It appears that we do not trust politicians one bit... Hello! Democracy cannot survive without politicians so we have no choice. we have to bring them to account one way or the other even if we do not trust them, or elect only trustworthy people if we must... But ...

Can we wait that long? Won’t make much difference to me, either I’ll be the oldest person on Earth by several light years or I’ll be pushing daisies from six foot under... But for our kiddies we need to do something...

We might have to support and provide ammunition to political parties we don’t really like... we might have to make unsavoury alliances... We have to expose incessantly the deviousness of Johnnee...
But we also have to be seen in the greater public face as a credible alternative and supply special tit-bits people crave... Tit-bits that can change the psyche of a nation...

Like “chips�? manufacturers we need to add salt and other little “secret ingredients�? that make people want to come back for more... We also need to “advertise�? This cost real money but if you want my opinion for what it’s worth, I’d say “press releases�? are more efficient because they become “editorials�? or comments (right or wrong) in papers and magazines and cost nothing to put up...

By inviting a pollie on this site, to “talk�? about his or her view on “democracy" you can hit both ways. Either they come then we can “press release�? what they say with a certain (low I admit) percentage of being picked up by the media or we “press release�? their refusal to talk about it... to which we can put a spin on it... We have to be bloody...

A friend of mine went to a MacDonald once and they’d run out of toys, still advertised on the window of the joint... He made a big fuss because his kid only wanted the toy... not the hamburger... and he was prepared to buy the hamburger only if the toy was supplied... He visited three MacDonalds and none had the toys... But most customers there took the absence of toys in their strides as they engulfed a “triple-bacon-cheeze-and-double-mince�?... as if it was perfectly okay for MacDonald not to have the toys they advertised on that day... because they said to the noisy brats that “they’d come back tomorrow and they’d get the toys then...�? The kids took the bait and the MacDonald clown grinned some more...

This is the crowd that votes in big numbers and find it okay that Johnnee tells big porkies because there must be a plausible reason behind them, like a “shipment of toilet bowls sunk in the middle of the pacific�?, or these people simply do not care... as long as they can stuff their faces...

They believe porkie after porkie to explain the first one as long as they complement each other... and “make sense�? despite being outrageously wrong...

They themselves use similar outrageous techniques in their own lives... Often learned from siblings and parents as well as daytime TV soaps designed to show human foibles, but what most people learn from those are the tricks of exposed deviousness... to become more devious...

THE FLUID NATURE OF HUMANITY
We are suckers... And as Tim Flannery so eloquently puts it we are also “Future Eaters�?. We consume on credit...

We are also creatures of habit... Life is a succession of habits. Habits that slowly develop and gel at some point in time of our life.

All species go through the motion of “birth�? (either by singular cell splitting or gamut combination), life in various stages of activity and death — all in a succession of individuals in which there are checks and balances with necessary variations and interaction with the environment, with extinction and evolution at the extreme of these variations. Behaviour is mostly predictable (habits) during these events. We all know of the Pavlov dog...

Humans have acquired the ability to change their environment to a much greater extend than all other species... Thus we can survive in larger numbers than the “natural�? environment can support... For some scientists we are like a plague... Like a disease that resist stronger antibiotics...

Whether we believe in a higher superior being or not, the reality is we are still attached to the biology of the very thin biosphere on this little planet we call Earth in the English language... Life is very fragile yet very strong having survived 3.6 billion years of evolution, changes and upheaval...

Humans are not indispensable for life to carry on although we are doing our best to extinguish many other species in order to prove our strength of purpose. Whether we are doing it deliberately or not, the reality is that we’re doing it.

As other animals do, we go through a process of change from infants with no clue about the world to old folks who may develop Alzheimer's... In between we experience natural upheavals like puberty, that many of our cultures and beliefs adopt as rituals and rites of passage...

Society accept different levels of responsibility for different purpose in the framework of these changes.

The age of reason is set a around seven...

In regard to carnal knowledge, marriage and liquor consumption or smoking tobacco we create age barriers...

CRUNCHING THE TRUE MATURITY NUMBER
But the true measure of being “grown up�? comes through the insurance industry where premiums for drivers under 25 are basically double the cost of older drivers. And insurance companies loose money on these... (the premiums are not allowed by law to be more than double)... And insurance companies are very sharp. When you renew your policy, the question which could appear discriminatory is very specific: “Er... no drivers under the age of 25?�? If so you get hit for another bundle of cash...

Why is this so...? Even if a young person is extremely careful, they are most likely to be distracted... and influenced... and ka-boom while others youngsters behind the wheel might be gun-ho about being alive with the desire to show off without care of being dead...
We old foggies have been through the motions... We’ve had our prangs... we’ve learned our lessons... We’ve developed the habit with the brake pedal...

We are creatures of habits... but we are slow learners.
Yet, amongst our behaviour we can develop some real bad habits... We all have the ability to become sadistic, masochistic and some of us can become psychopath...

Apparently if we are to believe a recent Catalyst report on the ABC, up to 2 per cent of the population carries a certain natural predisposition to being psychopathic and as we climb the social ladder towards the upper echelon of leadership it seems to concentrate the numbers as the characteristic required of a “modern�? leader are becoming more and more parallel with those of a psychopath...

My name is Hitler, Here I come...

Thus the specific questionnaire has answers fitting our Johnnee to a tee... It's a quiver in the lip that lies... It’s a lack of emotions except when one’s own survival is threatened for which someone else will wear the can, it’s a string-attached generosity with intent of double pay-back when it is applied, it also a smart way to compromise others in duplicity while never taking the blame nor the authorship of deviousness, It’s a way to take credit for other people’s work when it’s successful, and generally walk over those who are in the way... especially those who can expose your ruthless tactics...

It’s also claiming the high ground of “morality�?...

As mentioned before a society needs a certain mix of charity and social justice...

Social justice is the hardest to apply because it demands we accept an equality of purpose and ability... But it is the most necessary of the two as it removes the stigma attached to being less able that the other person. It can also create resentment if opportunists use the system to bludge a “free�? ride... But we can cope with a few extreme in that spectrum. Social justice operates in the sphere of “reason�?.

Charity has a subconscious baggage of guilt and of control. Sometimes it is not so subconscious... It becomes overt that we have to give voluntarily to appear generous of spirit... “Morality�? is entering our space once more... there are invisible threads attached... Charity applies in the sphere of “emotion�?.

When a psychopath demands us to be charitable he is pushing our buttons... he knows we are mostly suckers... When the government shifts from a social concern to a charitable adventure, with porkies by the truck load, we are stuck in the morality quagmire of being “generous�? when we should pine for being “just�?— in the arena of justice and social equity, even with all its faults and inevitable squabble...

At the moment the only squabble we have is which psychopath is going to be our prime minister in charge of the charitable organisation our government has become.

Thomas Jefferson would cry to see what has become of the modern ideals...

CRUNCHING SOME VOTES
In all this we have to be realist not pragmatist

Discounting informal votes, say approximately:
A few years ago:
35 per cent of voters were true blue Liberal
35 per cent were true believers Labor
4 per cent were committed Greens
4 per cent were floating Democrats
22 per cent were swinging voters...

Presently
30 per cent of voters are true blue Liberal
30 per cent are true believers Labor
5 per cent are committed Greens
2 per cent are floating Democrats
33 per cent are swinging voters...

At election time, of these 33 per cent
of swinging voters:
40 per cent might vote Liberal
30 per cent might vote Labor
20 per cent might vote Green
10 per cent might vote Democrat

Thus adding
13 per cent to Liberal
9 per cent to Labor
6 per cent to Greens
3 per cent to Democrats

Which should come to
43 per cent Liberal
39 per cent Labor
5 per cent Democrats
11 per cent greens

But due to preferences and deal makings and lack of representative in some electorate the figures of pollies in Canberra end up something like thus:
51 per cent Liberal
45 per cent Labor
3 per cent Green
1 per cent Democrat

How can we capture the elusive “half plus one�? in favour of truer democracy?... Do we wish to change that balance or live for a few more years under the Johnnee Tunes? Do we believe that we can convince enough politicians on the wrong side of the fence to become “turn coats�?? What motivates politicians as people?... Where are their weaknesses and strengths? Is “might is right�? correct? How can we debunk the lies?

The majority of people who decide our life — the elusive swinging voters — don’t want to know... They just want their little piece of comfort... Or they believe the louder spruiker and then go back to sleep once they get the sugar placebo... Do we start to make life uncomfortable for them? Will they punish us for it?

Well... till the next election “no go Jose...�?

But we need to prepare the ground for it to happen and it can’t happen unless the larger slice of the opposition is supported... In doing so we need to help Labor re-invent itself as well as convert more people to Green policies... It’s my feeling that Democrats although carrying a big name are not in the race unless they re-invent themselves too in a MAJOR big way... We have had more re-invention of the democrats than of leaders and that is not a plus... The purpose is lost. A splinter as “liberal with conscience�? is lacking in proper oomph in the right place for a democracy to work with balls...

Tactics devised by the advisers to the Labor Party in the last election seemed to have been playing catch up rather than kick the ball-carrier where it hurts... They might have been afraid that by attacking some of Johnnee’s policies they were going to attack similar policies they espoused... Also they were not prepared to commit a very strong opinion on the war in Iraq as it was snookered by Johnnee like the rest of us... Raising the spectre of Costello taking over from Johnnee was a waste of time and money... The Labor party need to reinvent the Social Issues without giving the words into Johnnee’s mouth where he will use them to gently shaft us all...

Of all the leaders we have had Keating was the most honest and always told it like it was despite using funny lingo... The media did not like him and painted a picture of an arrogant man, when actually he was a man with purpose and colour... Like all of us he had foibles but the media did not like him because he put a strong lid on their ability to consolidate their spruik and controlling ability...

Who controls information controls the world... If the media laws change our work will need to be ten times what it should be now and we’re far from it...

MORE NUMBERS TO CRUNCH
Iraq elastic figures...
In order to go to war, the western nations and the coalition off the willing had to paint a picture as black as could be of Saddam Hussein... WMDs did not work too well at the UN so then they opted for “regeeme�? change... Remove the Tyrant!!! The killer of his own people... He was black sure... but all the western countries provided him with the back paint and the brushes!!!

On the other side of the coin one can read he had to rule firmly in a country that had lots of insurgents (not freedom fighters as some could say) but people who would try to impose a different kind of despotism — an Islamic rule. Something that did frighten the pants out of George Bush Senior after Gulf War One thus he left Saddam in charge despite “Saddam’s crimes against humanity�?...

Even the CIA that had helped the Kurds revolt in Iraq, dropped them like a hot potato as they were described as freedom fighters in Iraq but the same lot were terrorists in Turkey... A friend of the US...

Here thus is an extract from one of my earlier post:

Although it is impossible to know the exact numbers to the unit, the TRUE DEATH TOLL, plus or minus a hundred in the small figures and plus or minus 2,000 in the higher figures, stands as thus:

1 million Iranian soldiers and 1 million Iraqi soldiers in he Iraq-Iran war of the 1980s that was FOUGHT ON BEHALF OF THE WESTERN NATIONS.
The US, the Europeans and the Russians were peddling weapons and intelligence (for what it was worth) to Saddam (and secretly helped Iran too).
The main unofficial reason was that Iran was naughty and needed to be taught a lesson for becoming fundamentalist. The second more secret reason is that the war was weakening these two countries resources, diminishing the risk of one becoming the more dominant force in the Middle East.

During his “regeeme�?, Saddam “assassinated�? about 60,000 people including 6,000 kurds in the north. The supposedly found mass graves were never as large mass graves as such... except those of the fallen soldiers.

In the invasion of Kuwait about 20,000 people died, including 3,000 Iraq soldiers...

During Gulf War One, Saddam’s army lost about 140,000 soldiers... The UN forces (US) lost around 500 combatants

During the trade embargo with Saddam after “victory�?
his troops lost around 3,000 solders in the administration of no fly zones and other little skirmishes....

During the trade embargo it has been estimated that 200,000 kids died through lack of medicines...

During Gulf War Two, between 70,000 and 100,000 people have lost their lives 1600 US/UK soldiers have died since and 10,000 are badly injured.

The total deaths, discounting the Iran Iraq war is not in favour of the West. Since at the end of Gulf War One, President “George the First�? knew that having “free�? elections in Iraq would prove disastrous as the country would go fundamentalist like Iran did a decade or so before, He left Saddam-the-despot in power. Imagine saying to Hitler the same thing?

Embargo and all that contributed to the death of kids as well as 20,000 other (kids and adults not counted here before) extra death from depleted uranium shells used to destroy Saddam's tanks.

"Freedom through war" comes at a very high price but as long as someone else pays with their blood, we think it’s okay... well it’s not... especially when other alternative are and were available.

Believe it or not but the number crunchers are still working in all the major parties and they tread on policies like egg shells except Howard, the master of spin, is trail-blazing the demise of social values by promoting morality... If we are Christian we have to fight ourselves in order to understand the differences...

Now where are all the people who marched in the streets against the war...
At the time it was claimed that at least 60 per cent of people opposed the war. What were their reasons? What were their emotions? Where are they now? why did this not translate as vote against Johnnee?

Are we all disinterested with the subject? Is it too hard to assemble three people in the street about it? are we afraid that we’ll be ridicule since everything now is cooked, done and buried? Or is it...? How many times did our Mr Downer claimed that Saddam had weapons of mass destruction? On tele and in Canberra?.... Three times? Two thousand times? Fifty thousand times? More?

More numbers to crunch next week or so...