Friday 29th of March 2024

Blogs

the romans had them...

romanssaudis

 

ABU DHABI, United Arab Emirates — Late one night last November, a plane carrying dozens of Colombian men touched down in this glittering seaside capital. Whisked through customs by an Emirati intelligence officer, the group boarded an unmarked bus and drove roughly 20 miles to a windswept military complex in the desert sand.

The Colombians had entered the United Arab Emirates posing as construction workers. In fact, they were soldiers for a secret American-led mercenary army being built by Erik Prince, the billionaire founder of Blackwater Worldwide, with $529 million from the oil-soaked sheikdom.

from struggle street .....

 

from struggle street .....

If you're earning $150,000 a year, are you living on Struggle Street? Should we be outraged for you if some government decides you don't need family benefits?

No. Taxation statistics imply that only 3 to 4 per cent of Australians earn $150,000 a year. Compared with other Australians, they're not struggling.

Far more Australians have household incomes over $150,000. Updating the latest household income data from the Bureau of Statistics, 17 per cent of households, or one in six, have pre-tax incomes of more than $150,000.

dirty little secrets ....

dirty little secrets .....

The illegal eavesdropping on famous people by the News of the World is said to be Rupert Murdoch's Watergate. But is it the crime by which Murdoch ought to be known? In his native land, Australia, Murdoch controls 70 per cent of the capital city press. Australia is the world's first murdochracy, in which smear by media is power.

the prince of puffery .....

the prince of puffery .....

Tony Abbott invoked the ghosts of Robert Menzies and Ben Chifley as he reached out last night to Australia's ''forgotten families'' and workers with the promise that he would lower their cost of living.

In a speech that was strongly critical of the government, deliberately short of new policies, and avoided taking positions on measures in the budget, the Opposition Leader said taxes and interest rates would be lower if he were elected.

hardly normal .....

hardly normal .....

The Communications Minister, Stephen Conroy, has hit back at criticism from the retailer Gerry Harvey over claims the government subsidy for pensioner set-top boxes is too costly.

After Mr Harvey claimed he could provide and install set-top boxes for less than half the average cost of the government's scheme, Senator Conroy yesterday challenged Mr Harvey to put his money where his mouth is and bid for the work.

Under the program, the government is offering to pay for certain households, including pensioners, to be connected to digital television at an average cost of $350 a household.

& the horse you rode in on .....

& the horse you rode in on .....

The fourth horseman thundered across the financial landscape yesterday, a discreet distance behind his three compatriots, who each paid their respects last week.

While they have yet to openly portray themselves as harbingers of the Last Judgment, there's no denying each of our big four bankers are making profits of biblical proportions.

Sir Ralph Norris is an affable kind of fellow ordinarily, except when his salary is mentioned in the newspaper, and probably would take great exception to being likened to the Pale Rider, or Death, as he is known in the Book of Revelation.

the show pony .....

the show pony .....

Tony Abbott's budget attack is shamelessly contradictory. He slams the $2 billion saving from family benefits as ''class warfare'' that will hit ''struggling families'', but he is also blaming the government for looming interest rate rises because he says it is spending too much.

get the behind me kevin .....

get the behind me kevin .....

restoring bushethics...

bushethics

Barack Obama, who pledged to restore ethical honour to the White House after the Bush years, is now burying himself under an active volcano of lies, mostly but not exclusively concerning the assassination of Osama bin Laden.

There was scarcely a sentence in the President's Sunday night address, or in the subsequent briefing by John Brennan, his chief counter-terrorism coordinator, that has not been subsequently retracted by CIA director Leon Panetta or the White House press spokesman, Jay Carney, or by various documentary records.

on the imperial mentality .....

on the imperial mentality .....

We might ask ourselves how we would be reacting if Iraqi commandos landed at George W. Bush's compound, assassinated him, and dumped his body in the Atlantic

It's increasingly clear that the operation was a planned assassination, multiply violating elementary norms of international law. There appears to have been no attempt to apprehend the unarmed victim, as presumably could have been done by 80 commandos facing virtually no opposition-except, they claim, from his wife, who lunged towards them. In societies that profess some respect for law, suspects are apprehended and brought to fair trial. I stress "suspects."

a pas de deux of terror …..

a pas de deux of terror …..

The hubris turns megalomanic as the President of the Most Powerful Nation on Earth grandly announces: "America can do whatever we set our mind to." The pattern falls into place. Bush the Senior had said years ago, "What We Say, Goes."

moral equivalents .....

moral equivalents .....

Just a few decades ago, during cold war, Communism was projected as Enemy Number One by United States and its minions. US policies aimed at conquering the World economically, politically and also militarily where possible. Socialist block was a big obstacle for US ambition. Around this time Russian army occupies Afghanistan, and supports Afghan Communist regimes' efforts to bring in land reforms.

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