nomadpete

I understand and agree with your view that Lib/Nat coalition is in poor shape, but in our political environment, they are still considered 'major'. Even though they only represent a minor threat at present. I hope you aren't suggesting the examples I gave, are in some way making the poor better off?

One party is the shyte party, and the other is the shyte lite party. Just because one is a bit less dodgy than the other, doesn't make sun shine from it's orifice.

Yes, Nev. And labor signed off the obscene Woodside gas deal, and also passed special laws to enable the foreign owned salmon fish farms to have special pollution exemptions. So I say, 'both major parties.'

That's a certainty. However i cannot give him credit for single handedly destroying a global civilisation. Civilisation (not always civil) will stumble on regardless. The tangerine toddler has simply acted out all the hidden failings of the world order. Failings that were previously dormant, or simply hidden, and until he came along, weaknesses were slowly eroding the moral fibre of world order. For instance, governments of most countries have always suffered from CEO type rot. The job description calls for a ruthless, results driven psychopath, usually overpaid. It doesn't call for a considerate egalitarian, fairminded person. The USA has a history of overt selfishness. Their glorification of capitalism overrides the welfare of the populace. Politics and War is all about making money. It's just that tRump makes it so obvious. As with our Australian system, both major parties are plainly in the pockets of the megarich. That is certainly not ethical.

Further to the Trump - Epstein saga: Thanks to the corrupt DOJ and their redactions, along with other high level supression of proper investigation, we are not likely to see the whole picture. This vid seems to summarise a fair bit: It seems a lot of very powerful folk are still keen to sweep it under the carpet.

Thanks, but my point remains.... why on earth woild we want or need to ship ANY beef from USA to Australia? Like importing ice to Eskimos.

I see that USA imports billions of $ worth of Australian beef, annually. Now I see that USA has exported $700,000,000 worth of beef to Australia. https://www.beefcentral.com/news/us-beef-officially-re-enters-australia-after-23-year-absence/ Can anyone explain how this makes sense? Are we exporting so much beef that we left our local market short? We do that with our gas exporting. Doesn't all this shipping back and forth push up the price to the public?

On another Middle East note, as if the wars there aren,'t already dirty enough, it looks like a big escalation has started. For the first time, a desalination plant has been struck. The implications for civillians are immense. % Potable water from desal plants: Iran: 3% UAE: 43% Saudi: 70% Kuwait: 90% Israel: 70% Oman: 86% Of this starts a tit-for-tat response, a lot of civilians might get thirsty and desperate very quickly.

Oh the irony. Iran makes Shahed drones. They sell them to Russia to use against Ukrainians. Of course they are using them now at home. USA has been wasting very expensive missiles to destroy Shaheds. (Patriot missiles?) To the point that USA is depleting their missile stocks. Now Ukraine are sending their own designed and Ukr made Sting interceptor drones designed especially for Shahed drones to help the US out! Cost? About $3500 each.

It's a bit mind bending to view the track from Aukland to Dubai. It flies via southern Tassie. I guess the great circle route is a straight line, but Mercator's projection makes the track appear ridiculously curved.

I use FR24 free app to find out what is flying past. Jets are pretty rare this far south. Many of the jets do not show up on FR24, I suspect military activity. One that was lowish, maybe under 10k, was grey, coming from due south. Others too high to see clearly. You'd expect them to have transponders on at least when overflying a capital city.

I'm no law expert, so my guess might be totally wrong. I thought that it has always been fair game to sink any enemy shipping, in a declared war. There have been many examples in the last, by all sides. But, is this conflict a declared war? Normal maritime law fobids sailing away from a shipwreck, without rendering assistance to survivors. Says a lot about the new Department of War.

At risk of thread drift, (getting back to the WARs), allow me to introduce my hero (sadly, deceased).... Col David Hackworth. Korean War & Viet Nam war. His book "About Face" is my go - to war book. Relevance? Simply this, "Has anything changed over the last 90 years when it comes to Americano arrogance and warmongering? I see the same sort of background happening now WRT Iran, as Col Hackworth observed during Viet Nam's war. Have they learned nothing? No exit plan. No "Mission Accomplished" target. No concrete mission plan. Lots of USA military might, but no follow up plan. PS I need to track down my copy of his book, leant it many times returened n-1 times

I have always wondered why nobody was invrstigating the money trail. Turns out they were. But that was kept quiet. And although there were suggestions that the results in likely successful prosecutions, nothing came of it. This is the 69 page memo I mentioned. Some curious un black bits. https://www.justice.gov/epstein/files/DataSet 9/EFTA00173953.pdf

Well the Middle East is a great success for USA. Haven't seen a headline about Epstein Files for ages! But a with little digging...... https://www.finance.senate.gov/ranking-members-news/wyden-questions-dea-over-mystery-epstein-investigation Seems that "Newly Uncovered, Heavily-Redacted Memorandum Reveals Epstein Was Targeted in a Major DEA Investigation into Possible Drug Trafficking and Money Laundering; Wyden Seeks Unredacted Memo and Details About the Investigation’s Conclusion........ Senator Wyden also requested a complete, unredacted copy of the document that revealed the existence of the investigation, a 69-page memorandum prepared in 2015 by the then-director of the Organized Crime Drug Enforcement Task Forces’ (OCDETF) Fusion Center. (The OCDETF, a specialized Department of Justice unit tasked with identifying and dismantling transnational organized crime and drug trafficking networks, was shut down by the Trump administration in 2025.) A heavily-redacted version of the memorandum was among the documents released following the passage of the Epstein Files Transparency Act." The names of fouteen persons of interest are redacted (note none were victims of sex offences), and hundreds of millions were alleged to have been shuffled, that should have raised money laundering flags.