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    Mind Your Language

    By
    Bob Day
    -
    1

    Everyone knows a suit is comprised of a jacket and a pair of pants. Two jackets are not a suit. Neither can two pairs of pants be called a suit. 

    This was an argument I often made during the marriage debate. Marriage, I argued, was the joining of a man and woman in a special relationship.  

    If two men or two women wished to be joined together then they can call it something else, but not marriage; not a suit.

    This idea of insisting that words reflect their true meaning and that things be called what they are, is not a new idea.

    As long ago as 500BC, Chinese philosopher Confucius said, “If names be not correct, language is not in accordance with the truth of things. If language be not in accordance with the truth of things, affairs cannot be carried on to success.”

    Modern day politics has become largely about controlling the language. 

    As US preacher Chuck Swindoll says, ‘they adopt our vocabulary but not our dictionary.’

    A person on 50 per cent of the median wage is officially on the ‘poverty line’.

    Farmers used to drain water-logged swamp areas of their land, and no-one batted an eye. 

    Then swamps were renamed ‘wetlands’, and now can’t be touched. 

    We’ve re-named euthanasia ‘dying with dignity’; abortion is now referred to as ‘reproductive health’ or ‘planned parenthood’ or simply ‘pro-choice’. 

    Free speech is branded hate speech, local aboriginal tribes have become ‘First Nations’, power cuts are now called ‘load shedding’, tax increases are re-badged as ‘budget savings’ and denying one’s gender has become gender affirming.

    A person on 50 per cent of the median wage is officially on the ‘poverty line’.

    ‘Safe schools’ and ‘respectful relationships’ are anything but – as evidenced by lessons in bestiality presented to 14-year-old schoolgirls in South Australia.

    The Good Book says, ‘Woe to those who say that evil is good and good is evil, that dark is light and light is dark, that bitter is sweet and sweet is bitter.’ – Isaiah 5:20.

    Then there are the perpetual ‘straw man’ arguments – misrepresenting an opponent’s position in order to quickly and easily destroy their argument.

    ‘Trickle-down economics’ is a straw man argument. There is no such theory in economics. But opponents of free-market economics invented the term ‘trickle-down’ to suggest free-markets are all about favouring the rich and hoping some of their wealth will ‘trickle down’ to those lower on the socio-economic ladder.

    Modern day politics has become largely about controlling the language. 

    Then there’s the ubiquitous use of the term ‘flat earthers’ when no-one, anywhere throughout history thought the world was flat. Not the Egyptians, not the Phoenicians, not the ancient Greeks; no-one thought the earth was flat. They weren’t silly. By standing on high ground and watching their tall ships sail over the horizon, they knew the earth was round, they just didn’t know how big it was. Christopher Columbus left Spain and headed west for India, not to prove the world was round, but to determine its size.

    Or the phrase Terra Nullius, a term used to manipulate debate on indigenous matters. 

    ‘Australia was founded on the basis of Terra Nullius,’ is one of those myths that survives by repetition, not historical fact.

    Terra Nullius is a Latin term meaning ‘land belonging to no one’. 

    Yet no-one ever said Australia was not occupied.

    The term ‘terra nullius’ was not mentioned anywhere in Australia until 1977!

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    Regarding exploration and occupation, the book 18th Century Principles of International Law stated that, “All territory not in the possession of states who are members of the family of nations and subjects of International Law must be considered as technically res nullius and therefore open to occupation”. ‘Res nullius’ – land not owned by a recognised nation, is not the same as ‘terra nullius’ – land not occupied by anyone e.g. Antarctica.

    And on a similar vein, that Aborigines didn’t get the vote, or were treated as ‘flora and fauna,’ until 1967. 

    All false. All examples of the mutilation of language to influence political debate. US author Michael Malice writes, ‘they’re not using language to communicate, they’re using it to manipulate.’

    Broken Systems and the Deteriorating Psyche of Our Nation.

    By
    Gerardine Hoogland
    -
    2

    Australia is on life support – politicians “and” the people are both to blame.

    Few people could deny that Australia is not well.

    The cost of living is unacceptably high. Home ownership is a long-lost dream. Our mental health is deteriorating rapidly. We are at war with one another over almost every issue. Polite debate has disappeared from our public discourse, and in many cases, from our personal interactions. 

    Who is to blame? Because, hey, we must have someone or something to blame. It simply cannot be our own fault! 

    Mostly we blame the politicians, but we also hear a lot of talk about how broken the system is, as if the system itself is responsible. 

    Systems don’t break themselves, just as they don’t build themselves. They are created from human endeavour, and they collapse from the impact of human force and negligence. 

    The tragedy is that we do not lack examples on how to avoid disaster. 

    Our political systems and institutions are only as good or bad as the people who construct and manage them. While it is easy to blame the politicians – those who we elect – for the decimation of the framework that was designed to serve us all well, blame must also land on we the people for not paying more attention to how it works, and the calibre of those we send to serve us. 

    Most people look to Great Britain for the roots of our Westminster system, but in fact the Western world inherited the core principles of our representative democracy from the ancient Romans. Not only were they brilliant builders and engineers, but they created a political system that would endure for two thousand years. 

    It was comprised of three levels of government – Consuls, Senate, and the People. The Ancient Greek historian, Polybius, described it as the best form of Constitution due to its interdependence and reliance on all three elements. 

    “For whenever some common external threat compels the three to unite and work together, the strength which the state then develops becomes quite extraordinary.” 

    What a rousing endorsement this is! 

    While it served Rome well enough during its rise and dominance of the then known world, it deteriorated steadily from the second century BC through lack of preservation, and eventually was replaced by an Empire. Polybius cites its demise as owing to the cycle of political revolution:

    “…the law of nature according to which constitutions change, are transformed, and finally revert to their original form.”

    Our political systems and institutions are only as good or bad as the people who construct and manage them. 

    Cicero, however, places its downfall squarely on the shoulders of men.

    “Thus, before our own time, the customs of our ancestors produced excellent men, and eminent men preserved our ancient customs and the institutions of their forefathers. But though the republic, when it came to us, was like a beautiful painting, whose colours, however, were already fading with age, our own time not only has neglected to freshen it by renewing the original colours, but has not even taken the trouble to preserve its configuration and, so to speak its general outlines. 

    For the loss of our customs is due to our lack of men, and for this great evil we must not only give an account, but must even defend ourselves in every way possible, as if we were accused of capital crime.  For it is through our own faults, not by any accident, that we retain only the form of the commonwealth, but have long since lost its substance…”

    Mankind envisions, and they destroy. And most often the destruction occurs dramatically fast. Cue what we are witnessing now in our own time. 

    It remains debatable as to whether it is intentional or a result of sheer incompetence. I argue it is a lethal combination of both. 

    The tragedy is that we do not lack examples on how to avoid disaster. The Roman historian, Livy, said it best:

    “The study of history is the best medicine for a sick mind; for in history you have a record of the infinite variety of human experience plainly set out for all to see; and in that record you can find for yourself and your country both examples and warnings; fine things to take as models, base things, rotten through and through, to avoid.”

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    Democracy is a cautionary tale. I’ve presented here examples from the past by some of the finest historical minds, gifted to us in the hope we may learn from their mistakes and misfortunes. 

    Alas, the cycle continues. We rise, and we fall. I ponder if there will ever rise a generation who can put a spoke in the wheel of this endless ignorance. Of course, that would require a fundamental shift in the willingness to heed lessons from the past and apply only those new principles where they are truly needed.

    Vic’s Very Naughty Boys in Blue

    By
    Lushington D Brady
    -
    1

    Reproduced with permission from The BFD

    https://thebfd.co.nz/2024/05/02/vics-very-naughty-boys-in-blue

    Why would anyone trust police in Victoria any more? Politicised, corrupt and hypocritical, VicPol’s reputation has been battered on all fronts over the past few years.

    It wasn’t just the naked brutality of the Covid era, when Victoria Police rolled out assault vehicles and locked down the skies, smashed old ladies into the roads, and opened up with teargas and rubber bullets on the sacred grounds of the Shrine of Remembrance. It wasn’t just the deep-rooted corruption revealed by the Lawyer X and Red Shirts.

    When the High Court ruled that the George Pell trial was perhaps the most egregious miscarriage of justice since the Chamberlain saga, VicPol were in the thick of it. Police pursued an obvious vendetta against the Cardinal, setting up a “Get Pell” squad to troll for dirt, before even a single criminal complaint had been made.

    And, yes, no doubt the vast majority of VicPol employees are law-abiding — but the same could be said of priests.

    As it turns out, VicPol might have been better removing the beam in their own eyes, first.

    Some 78 Victoria Police officers and Protective Service Officers are facing criminal charges and traffic offences, with a disturbing number relating to serious sex offences including rape, sexual assault and indecent acts against children including possessing and producing child pornography.

    Three charges of rape and five sexual assault charges against police are among 19 sex charges before the courts, in addition to a range of sex offences allegedly committed against children aged under 16.

    One police officer faces a charge of incest relating to a ­sibling.

    Casting the first stone, indeed.

    Like the Church they pursued so doggedly, it seems the rozzers have more than a few skeletons they’ve been trying their darnedest to keep in their closets.

    The police crime data – released by Victoria Police after a request from The Australian – cover offences allegedly committed by 68 officers on and off duty.

    And, yes, the criminality goes all the way to the top.

    Police pursued an obvious vendetta against the Cardinal, setting up a “Get Pell” squad to troll for dirt, before even a single criminal complaint had been made.

    The 73 police officers facing charges and traffic offences include seven first constables, 20 senior constables, 26 leading senior constables, 14 sergeants, five senior sergeants and one ranked inspector or above and they face a total of about 130 charges […]

    Five PSOs are facing criminal charges, with two relating to an indecent act against a child aged under 16 and one of alleged sexual penetration of a child aged under 16. Of the PSOs charged, two were general PSOs and three senior PSOs […]

    Victoria Police said it was releasing the data as part of a commitment to transparency and stressed the vast majority of the force’s almost 18,000 police officers and PSOs were law-abiding, noting the data showed just 0.435 per cent of the force was facing criminal charges.

    The Australian

    Except, if the data has to be sought out by journalists instead of being made proactively available to the public, one might be justifiably sceptical about that “commitment to transparency”.

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    And, yes, no doubt the vast majority of VicPol employees are law-abiding — but the same could be said of priests. Yet, the presence of a small, but egregiously criminal, minority was sufficient to blacken the Church’s name. Not to mention attract the zealous attack dogs of Victoria Police.

    When institutions show that they cannot be trusted, social harmony takes a battering. Few institutions are as critical as law enforcement — and, in Victoria at least, they’re giving citizens increasingly less reason to trust them.

    The Tax Power

    By
    Adam Craig
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    0

    The Commissioner of Taxation has too much power. 

    Libertarians consider tax to be either theft or, at best, should be low and flat to cover bare necessities. It certainly shouldn’t be as complex as it is or run to thousands of pages. 

    Most mainstream tax reform proponents have grandiose visions that would only add complexity and likely raise the overall tax burden. Libertarians rightly oppose those ideas as they come. 

    However, there is an easy win that ought to be important to libertarians: we need to limit the Commissioner of Taxation’s powers. It’s not exciting work, like developing new systems, but it is significant. 

    First, the Commissioner has too much power to amend assessments. 

    Australia has a self-assessment tax system. That means we declare income and allowable deductions, which the Commissioner accepts but can then amend if he considers the taxpayer was wrong. 

    Libertarians can demand fairer amendment periods, a fairer burden of proof, and less funding for the Commissioner. 

    For individuals the Commissioner can amend an assessment within two years. For businesses, it is usually four years. 

    However, the relevant section of the law for income tax – leaving aside equivalent sections for other taxes – is around 3000 words– because it contains “ifs” and “buts” to protect the Commissioner. 

    For example, if the Commissioner makes a tax avoidance determination, he can have four years instead of two years to change an assessment. If the Commissioner believes there has been fraud or evasion, he has an unlimited amendment period. If the Commissioner believes a particular section of the tax law relating to trusts applies, he again has an unlimited amendment period.  

    These powers predate most of this century’s technological advances, which enable the Commissioner to work more efficiently and collect more data. Also, many amendments to the tax law in recent years have made it easier for the Commissioner to apply the law, including changes to avoidance laws favouring the Commissioner.

    It must be a libertarian position to reduce amendment periods. 

    Second, the Commissioner does not need to prove anything in litigation. The starkest example of this rule operating unjustly is when the Commissioner has amended a taxpayer’s assessment because he believes fraud or evasion has occurred. 

    The Commissioner need only believe there has been fraud or evasion. 

    He can form this opinion about any year – 2003, for example. And if he goes back to 2003, he will likely repeat that for many subsequent years, and he will apply penalties and interest. 

    Most mainstream tax reform proponents have grandiose visions that would only add complexity

    Suppose the matter is in the Australian Administrative Appeals Tribunal or the Federal Court of Australia. The Commissioner will not need to prove the truth of his opinion. Also, it doesn’t matter if the taxpayer proves the Commissioner’s opinion was wrong. The taxpayer’s task, two decades later, is to show that its accounting was correct. Not surprisingly, most people do not have records that go back that far. 

    It must be a libertarian position to oppose the power to simply deem fraud, and to demand a time limit on the exercise of the fraud or evasion power. The Commissioner should have an obligation to prove fraud or evasion has occurred before the taxpayer must prove its accounts. 

    Third, the Commissioner is emboldened to use his amendment powers through funding. The Commissioner receives substantial funding to run the Australian Taxation Office. 

    Libertarians would rightly want that funding limited. 

    However, there is also a perpetual cycle of giving the Commissioner additional funding to use his amendment powers, particularly under the auspices of tax avoidance.   

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    Libertarians would want that funding limited because it encourages the Commissioner to use his firmest amendment powers. It also raises questions about the management of public finances – should the Commissioner be “rewarded” with additional funding for things he should already be doing? 

    Libertarians can demand fairer amendment periods, a fairer burden of proof, and less funding for the Commissioner. 

    It would be hard to think that most taxpayers would not be libertarians regarding these issues.

    The Global Online Safety Regulators Network: A Global Surveillance State?

    By
    Jaimie Stevenson
    -
    1

    The journalist Michael Schellenberger recently discovered that there is a formal government censorship network called the “Global Online Safety Regulators Network” (GORSN).  Australia’s top Internet censor, Julie Inman Grant, an American, described it at the World Economic Forum. The group includes censors from Australia, France, Ireland, South Africa, Korea, the UK, and Fiji. 

    This is a concerning development for anyone who values freedom of speech and privacy. The initiative aims to create a global coalition of regulators to combat harmful online content. However, in reality it is a veiled attempt at global censorship of the internet, aimed at circumventing the protections provided by Virtual Private Networks (VPNs).

    At its core, GORSN seeks to coordinate censorship efforts across international borders. Libertarians and advocates of free expression have long warned against concentrated government control, arguing that it almost inevitably leads to abuse and suppression of dissenting voices.

    The network’s capacity to enforce censorship and surveillance across borders is a direct threat to individual freedoms and the right to privacy.

    Grant outlined the significant powers that regulators within the GORSN have at their disposal. She said that GORSN members can block internet service providers (ISPs), compel content takedowns, fine individuals or platforms that host offensive content, and impose other punitive measures as deterrents. Additionally, Grant discussed a new legislative framework that allows regulators to enforce basic online safety expectations. This framework’s scope suggests that GORSN aims to exercise substantial control over the internet, raising concerns about censorship, regulatory overreach, and the broader impact on freedom of expression and privacy.

    Another alarming aspect of GORSN is its potential to invade privacy on a global scale. Grant’s remark that the network had the power to compel “basic device information and account information” are a stark warning that the network could enable mass surveillance. For libertarians, privacy is a very high priority and the notion that regulators could gather personal data without appropriate oversight is a worrying development. Broad powers to compel information from tech platforms suggests that GORSN could become a mechanism for government surveillance on an international level.

    Grant’s mention of social media companies increasingly collecting phone numbers and email addresses raises the spectre of a surveillance state, where governments can easily track individuals and monitor their online activities. This level of intrusion into personal privacy should be of concern to anyone who believes in the right to remain anonymous and free from unwarranted government scrutiny.

    GORSN’s push for global identity requirements and restrictions on VPNs is a direct assault on digital autonomy. VPNs are essential tools for maintaining privacy and accessing information freely, especially in countries with oppressive internet regulations. Any move to limit their use would further erode individual freedoms and strengthen authoritarian regimes.

    The centralised control proposed by GORSN threatens to undermine the fundamental principle of a decentralised internet where individuals can maintain their anonymity and exercise their rights without fear of government intrusion, leading to an internet that is more tightly monitored and regulated by governments with varying degrees of respect for freedom and democracy.

    GORSN seeks to coordinate censorship efforts across international borders

    The sheer scope of GORSN’s power, including the ability to fine content hosts, compel takedowns, and block ISPs, is a classic case of regulatory overreach. When governments are given this level of authority, the risk of abuse is high. Such power can be used to suppress dissent, stifle criticism, and enforce a particular worldview, all under the guise of “online safety.”

    From a libertarian perspective, the existence of GORSN is a troubling development that undermines the ideals of a decentralised internet. The network’s capacity to enforce censorship and surveillance across borders is a direct threat to individual freedoms and the right to privacy. Instead of a collaborative effort to address harmful content, GORSN represents a centralised approach that risks creating a global surveillance state.

    The Global Online Safety Regulators Network is a danger to internet freedom. Its focus on centralised control, coupled with its broad powers, sets a dangerous precedent for governments seeking to extend their reach into the digital world. As the network gains momentum, it is crucial that libertarians and other advocates of free speech push back against this overreach and defend the principles of a decentralised internet.

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    Platforms like X and Rumble have taken public stances opposing intrusive government requests for content takedowns and data collection. Chris Pavlovski, the founder of Rumble, highlighted this issue in a recent post on X, stating, “Rumble has received censorship demands from Australia, New Zealand, and other countries that infringe on everyone’s human rights. We are noticing a dramatic increase in global censorship unlike we’ve ever seen before.” Elon Musk, the owner of X, endorsed this sentiment, indicating a shared concern among tech leaders.

    But it takes more than a couple of tech leaders to fight censorship. To push back against government intrusion and censorship there are several measures that individuals can undertake. Support platforms that actively resist censorship and champion free speech, use VPNs to preserve online privacy and bypass censorship. Importantly, connect through servers in countries that are not part of the GORSN. This can help avoid unwanted surveillance and ensure a greater degree of anonymity while online.

    Too Much Government

    By
    David Leyonhjelm
    -
    0

    Expectations of the role of the government have been rising steadily over the last decade. They rose substantially during the eastern states’ bushfires in late 2019 and early 2020, and again in response to the floods that followed in NSW and Queensland. And they reached stratospheric levels during the Covid panic.

    Judged by the number of lives lost, those bushfires were far from the worst on record. Nonetheless, they were characterised as ‘unprecedented’ and prompted a chorus of demands for the Prime Minister to get involved. When it was discovered he had gone to Hawaii for a holiday with his family, he was accused of being negligent for leaving the country at such a time. 

    The Prime Minister did not leave the country when NSW and Queensland were hit by floods, but the opprobrium he attracted could hardly have been worse if he did. The floods were again described as unprecedented amid a chorus of claims the government should have acted sooner and done more. 

    The Covid schemozzle was obviously unprecedented and nobody could go anywhere. Once again, the Prime Minister and federal government were blamed – there were insufficient vaccines, the border should have been closed sooner, hotel quarantine was a failure, lockdowns were inadequate, plus a multitude of other perceived failures. All this despite the worst harm being done by state governments. 

    Thousands of kids were inspired to join the surf lifesavers, setting an example for the rest of the world.

    Perhaps it is not surprising that many people think of the Prime Minister and the federal government when they think of ‘the government’. Federal politics tends to dominate the news, while the public’s understanding of our system of government is pretty dismal. Much of the media is pretty ignorant too, although hostility to Liberal leaders is also a factor.  

    But what these narratives reveal is that the expectations now placed on governments, of any kind, are higher than they have ever been. Whether it is floods, fires, droughts, earthquakes, cyclones or disease outbreaks, there is a popular and growing view that the government should not only be there to pick up the pieces, but should have anticipated the calamity and done everything possible to head it off. 

    By any standard this is both ridiculous and contradictory. Government is, after all, made up of politicians and public sector bureaucrats. Neither are experts at how the real world works so cannot possibly know what to do.

    Most people readily acknowledge that governments are inefficient, bureaucratic and slow, yet somehow cling to the belief that next time will be different and more government will get it right. 

    In fact, Australia’s problem is too much government. From petty, intrusive local councils to authoritarian state governments and over-taxing, over-spending, ‘more money will fix it’ federal government, there is just too much of it. 

    The problem with this is obvious. The world is complex and changing – in social attitudes, world economics, geo-politics and of course technology. There is no way that politicians, public sector bureaucrats or regulators can hope to supervise or manage it. They are also often remote from the problems – how, for example, can a bureaucrat in Canberra possibly know enough to make a decision about a cyclone in Broome? 

    The famous economist Friedrich Hayek noted how difficult it was for people to fathom that local decision making leads to more efficient outcomes than central planning by politicians and public sector bureaucrats.

    “The curious task of economics is to demonstrate how little they really know about what they imagine they can design.

    To the naive mind that can conceive of order only as the product of deliberate arrangement, it may seem absurd that in complex conditions order, and adaptation to the unknown, can be achieved more effectively by decentralizing decisions.”

    Expectations of the role of government have been rising steadily over the last decade. 

    There was a time, not that long ago, when Australia was a proud volunteer society. Moreover, almost everything was local.

    Thousands of kids were inspired to join the surf lifesavers, setting an example for the rest of the world. Volunteer fire fighters saved whole communities. Dozens of charities, not just the Salvation Army and Red Cross, all volunteers, provided help and hope to those in need. 

    Indeed, prior to the emergence of the welfare state in the second half of the twentieth century, volunteer charities were involved in health care, childcare, education, unemployment and disability support. In the nineteenth century you would have been considered weird if you had predicted that most of these would end up being run by governments. These days you’d be called weird for suggesting volunteers might do them better. 

    Volunteers are still the first responders in many fire and flood emergencies as families, neighbours and friends rally around. Next are typically agencies such the State Emergency Service and Rural Fire Service in NSW, and their equivalents in the other states. Both are still volunteer based, although increasingly under the control of full-time public servants and subject to the inefficiencies of government bureaucracy. In Victoria, the sad decline of the CFA at the hands of the unions is an example of that.  

    A tragic example of the harm being done to our volunteer society was seen during the Covid pandemic when many volunteers were required to be fully vaccinated. Unvaccinated volunteers were turned away and not permitted to fight fires or rescue flood victims, even when working outside where infection was rare.  

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    Even after it became obvious that Covid vaccines did not prevent infection or transmission, the obligation to be fully vaccinated was retained. This was not only unscientific but also destructive. It seriously undermined the capacity of those organisations to help people. In NSW, RFS volunteers on the Central Coast fell by about 50% and in other areas SES volunteers left and some SES stations closed.

    It also led to increasing demands for the federal government to bring in the ADF. Obviously ADF members are not volunteers, but they are also not intended to be used as emergency workers. Indeed, using the ADF for anything other than the defence of the country undermines its purpose and reduces its capabilities. 

    While we sometimes hear governments claiming to honour volunteers, the trend is downhill. The more red tape, bureaucratic oversight and regulation imposed, the more volunteers bail out.

    A Digital Dark Age (part 2)

    By
    Bob Day
    -
    0

    The only currency that matters is power – getting it and holding on to it.

    Attaining power these days involves denigrating and silencing your opponents in any way possible: censoring them, branding what they say as misinformation, disinformation or malinformation, with the primary aim being to prevent them getting their message out.

    As has been observed, ‘When ideas are bad, censorship will always be more attractive than debate.’

    In a recent renewable energy report, Energy Infrastructure Commissioner Andrew Dyer summed up in one concise sentence why governments relish powers like the ones being proposed. 

    Dyer said, “Opposition is often driven by ‘misinformation’.”

    That is what is called a ‘shibboleth’.

    Shibboleth is a Hebrew word meaning ‘stream’. It is referred to in the Old Testament book of Judges, where Jephthah and the men of Gilead fought the Ephraimites and captured the Jordan River crossing. As people crossed the river, to distinguish who was friend from foe, they had everyone say the word ‘shibboleth’. If they couldn’t pronounce it properly, they knew they were the enemy. From this, the word shibboleth was absorbed into the English language to describe a key identifier or a dead give-away.

    What we saw in the Energy Commissioner’s comment was that dead give-away.

    Once this Bill is law, all the government has to do is label something ‘misinformation’ or ‘disinformation’ to have it shut down. Presto! Any opposition is eliminated.

    Historically, the media has fought hard to maintain freedom of the press and freedom of expression. 

    Internationally, ‘misinformation and disinformation’ have risen to number one on the list of top 10 risks cited by the World Economic Forum’s (WEF) Global Risks Report 2024. 

    Addressing the recent WEF conference, European Union President Ursula von der Leyen said: ‘Like in all democracies, our freedom comes with risks. There will always be those who try to exploit our openness, both from inside and out. There will always be attempts to put us off track – for example, with ‘misinformation and disinformation.’

    The politics of fear

    Fear has always been a powerful political motivator. Fear makes people accept things they wouldn’t otherwise accept. 

    In the 16th Century, Niccolo Machiavelli wrote The Prince, a book that would influence political strategy and tactics for the next 500 years. 

    Machiavelli’s book centred on the use of fear to control the masses – ‘The best course of action for a ruler to take is to instil fear in the people’, he said.  

    And for people to not only fear what might happen, but that they would also ‘fear the worst’.

    Minister Rowland has said misinformation and disinformation pose a threat to ‘the safety and wellbeing of Australians’ and ‘to our democracy, society and economy’.

    This is the politics of fear.

    And the antidote to fear is knowledge – information, facts, figures. Which is why they want the power to prevent people from receiving it.

    Conflating issues also plays a useful role.

    As well as the Misinformation and Disinformation Bill, Minister Rowland has also announced a review of the Online Safety Act, saying the government is committed to introducing a revised version of its ‘internet censorship laws’.

    The Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) hit back:

    “It is completely disingenuous for the Minister to seek to conflate the protection of Australians from predators online with the federal government’s plan to empower bureaucrats in Canberra (ACMA) with the right to determine what is truth, and to censor mainstream opinion through its ‘misinformation’ bill,” said the IPA’s John Storey.

    “The federal government is cravenly using heightened concerns about current tensions in parts of our community, and the fears of parents and others about harmful online content, as a trojan horse to push forward laws that will in practice impose political censorship,” he said.

    Climate Change

    South Australia’s chief public health officer, Professor Nicola Spurrier, recently warned that the nation is facing a state of “permacrisis” as climate change fuels ‘back-to-back natural disasters and the emergence of new diseases’.

    In her biennial report on the state of public health, Prof. Spurrier calls climate change ‘the most significant global threat to human health’, saying the planet is getting hotter and is experiencing more extreme weather events such as flooding and bushfires.

    ‘We need to respond to this threat today, not tomorrow or in the distant future,’ her report states. ‘These changes to the climate are caused by humans.’

    Prof. Spurrier’s report says this will lead to exacerbation of chronic diseases such as heart, lung and kidney disease; damaged food crops; increased risk of food poisoning and water contamination; injuries from flooding and bushfires; and even an increase in snake bites after floods.

    ‘Other health impacts from climate change include poor air quality due to increased dust and pollens and the emergence of serious new communicable diseases in South Australia, such as Japanese encephalitis virus,’ she says.

    Mercifully, she spared us plagues of locusts and frogs and the Murray River turning to blood.

    Attaining power these days involves denigrating and silencing your opponents in any way possible

    This is ‘permacrisis’ – permanent crisis – putting communities into a permanent state of climate fear.

    Machiavelli would be proud. 

    The Voice to Parliament Referendum

    When the Yes side didn’t win the Voice Referendum, they immediately blamed, you guessed it – misinformation.

    Yes campaign director Dean Parkin, said the referendum result was due to ‘the single largest misinformation campaign that this country has ever seen’.

    Yes campaign spokesperson Thomas Mayo blamed the ‘disgusting No campaign, a campaign that has been dishonest, that has lied to the Australian people’.

    Teal MP Zali Steggell even introduced a private members’ bill with the title Stop the Lies. 

    Ms Steggall stated that it was clear that the information people had access to through the course of the Voice debate was ‘heavy with misleading and deceptive facts’.

    Got that? ‘Misleading and deceptive facts’, the very definition of malinformation.

    Governments, technology and third-party collaborators

    Baptists and Bootleggers

    Whenever there is money to be made, opportunities to do business with governments – that is, do the government’s bidding in exchange for special access and privileges – present themselves. Cosy relationships between businesspeople and governments are as old as regulation itself.

    What can give these relationships real potency is what has been called the ‘Baptists and Bootleggers’ phenomenon. The term stems from the 1920s’ Prohibition days, when members of the US government received bribes and donations from Bootleggers – criminals and businesspeople eager to maintain a scarcity (and resulting high price) of their product (alcohol). These same Members of Congress then justified maintaining the prohibition by publicly adopting the moral cause of the Baptists.

    The same applies here. A moral cause – ‘threats to the safety and wellbeing of Australians’, and financial rewards to those assisting governments in their pursuit of power. 

    Historically, the media has fought hard to maintain freedom of the press and freedom of expression. 

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    However, new media have no such compunction. As more and more people source their news through Google, Facebook, X, Tik Tok, Instagram and other social media platforms, these global behemoths exert more and more power and influence. And while the old press barons took free speech seriously, big tech sees no problem at all in doing the government’s bidding – provided the government maintains their ‘platform, not publisher’ status and the advertising money keeps flowing. Al Capone may have invented bootlegging, but big tech has certainly perfected it.

    Tech entrepreneur and former Google insider Tristan Harris says we are in the midst of a ‘great social upheaval’. Technology, he says, is being used to attack the very foundation of what we trust. ‘We are entering a Digital Dark Age’. 

    Digital IDs Drivers’ licences, proof of age cards, passports, Medicare cards, birth certificates, home addresses, MyGov IDs, tax returns, credit cards and banking details, remote-controlled smart meters on our homes, digital certificates of title for our properties. Once these are all linked – as the government ads say, ‘bringing together government and industry’, the government’s control will be complete.

    Tomorrow – part 3

    A Digital Dark Age

    By
    Bob Day
    -
    0

    Step into my parlour, said the spider to the fly,
    ‘Tis the prettiest little parlour, that ever you did spy,
    Oh no, no! then said the fly, to ask me is in vain,
    For who goes up to your winding stair, 

    Can ne’er come down again.

    Mary Howitt’s old poem could well be describing another web, the one that ensnares us all – the world-wide-web.

    Every aspect of our lives is connected to this web – most notably our source of nearly all the information on which we base life’s decisions. It is because of this web, that we are now in this predicament. 

    We have all been caught, and to quote Mary Howitt, we’re ‘ne’er coming down again’.

    In January 2023, the Minister for Communications, Michelle Rowland, announced that the Albanese Government would introduce new laws to provide the media regulator – the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA) – with ‘new powers to combat online misinformation and disinformation’.

    The proposed new bill, the Communication Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation and Disinformation) Bill, would:

    The government, of course, will not be subject to any of these new laws. It has exempted itself.

    – Enable ACMA to gather information from global tech companies and require them to keep certain records about matters regarding misinformation and disinformation and provide those records to ACMA.

    – Enable ACMA to request industry to develop, vary and/or register a code of practice covering measures to combat misinformation and disinformation on digital platforms, which ACMA could then register and enforce.

    – Allow ACMA to create and enforce an industry standard, should a code of practice be deemed ineffective in combatting misinformation and disinformation on digital platforms

    – Empower ACMA to regulate electoral and referendum content, but NOT the power to regulate political parties with regard to misleading and/or deceptive conduct.

    – Empower the Minister to direct ACMA to conduct investigations into any matter regarding misinformation or disinformation and empower the Minister to set the terms of reference for any such investigation.

    The Bill also provides for significant penalties for digital platforms or individuals that do not comply with the Bill and/or the new codes and standards the Bill creates. Penalties include:

    – Imprisonment of up to 12 months for providing false or misleading information to ACMA.

    – Non-attendance at an ACMA investigation hearing of up to 33 penalty units ($9,000) for each day of non-attendance.

    – Non-compliance with a registered code of up to 10,000 penalty units ($2.75 mill) or 2% of global turnover (whatever is greater).

    – Non-compliance with an industry standard of up to 25,000 penalty units ($6.88 mill) or 5% of global turnover (whatever is greater).

    Other penalties may also apply. 

    The government, of course, will not be subject to any of these new laws. It has exempted itself.

    Every aspect of our lives is connected to this web – most notably our source of nearly all the information on which we base life’s decisions.

    Ms Rowland said the government was committed to introducing legislation that would fine social media companies for allowing misinformation or disinformation to be broadcast on their platforms. 

    Misinformation is defined as ‘false information that is spread due to ignorance, or by error or mistake, without the intent to deceive’. 

    Disinformation is defined as ‘false information designed to deliberately mislead and influence public opinion or obscure the truth for malicious or deceptive purposes.’

    “In the face of seriously harmful content that sows division, undermines support for pillars of our democracy, or disrupts public health responses, doing nothing is not an option.

    “The proposal would empower the regulator to examine the systems and processes these tech giants already have in place, and develop standards should industry self-regulation measures prove insufficient in addressing the threat posed by misinformation and disinformation”.

    Harsh words indeed.

    In its submission to the draft bill, the Law Council of Australia warned that the proposal could have a ‘chilling effect on freedom of expression’ by allowing social media giants and the communications watchdog (ACMA) to decide what constitutes information, opinion and claims online.

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    And in case anyone is thinking this is solely a Labor Party contrivance, before the 2022 election the Morrison government pledged to, ‘… introduce stronger laws to combat harmful disinformation and misinformation online by giving the media regulator stronger information-gathering and enforcement powers’.

    To cap it all off, waiting in the wings is ‘mal-information’, defined as ‘truth which is used to inflict harm on a person, organisation or country’ and ‘information that stems from the truth, but is often portrayed in a way that misleads and/or causes potential harm.’

    To invoke Climate Czar and former US Presidential candidate Al Gore, malinformation might be otherwise described as ‘an inconvenient truth’.

    Tomorrow: part 2.

    Another Round of the Circus

    By
    Lushington D Brady
    -
    0

    Reproduced with permission from The BFD https://thebfd.co.nz/2024/04/16/another-round-of-the-circus/

    Another day, another court case, and the scandal that just keeps on giving… keeps on giving.

    Justice Michael Lee has handed down his verdict in Bruce Lehrmann’s defamation suit against Channel Ten and Lisa Wilkinson — and what a curious judgement it is. On the one hand, Lee states what has been obvious from the beginning, that both Brittany Higgins and Bruce Lehrmann are “unreliable historians”. Both, as he notes, have told a great many lies.

    He also hints that the case would likely not have passed the bar of a criminal trial.

    Yet, for all that, he feels justified in “I just reckon”ing what happened in a senator’s office that night.

    ‘I’m convinced … that sexual intercourse did take place, and that took place with Mr Lehrmann on top of Ms Higgins on the couch in the minister’s office’

    Yet, the only evidence for this is the assertion of a woman whom he also says “was not fully aware of her surroundings”.

    The only thing that’s certain about this whole sordid affair is that the media-political class will continue to exploit it for all they can milk. 

    Justice Lee states that, as video and witness evidence shows, both Lehrmann and Higgins were drinking and “passionately kissing and posing for selfies taken by Ms Higgins”. Higgins also willingly accompanied Lehrmann on the fateful Uber ride, when everyone else elected to go home. He further just reckons that:

    He has found it’s unlikely Brittany Higgins said “no”, and more likely she was passive during the incident.

    Those of us unburdened by a prestigious legal career might be given to wonder how the learned judge feels justified in making such a crucial statement, given that he is, as he says, relying on two most unreliable people.

    Still, he’s the learned judge, and I’m just a tosser with a keyboard. I guess we’ll just have to defer to his learned wisdom.

    Bruce Lehrmann “told deliberate lies” when giving evidence, but is not a compulsive liar, Justice Michael Lee says.

    As such, he will not accept any evidence from Mr Lehrmann unless it is corroborated by a reliable witness or a document, or amounts to an admission.

    Yet he accepts Higgins’ uncorroborated evidence, despite also finding that she also lied about a great many key matters, and,

    “selectively curated material” on her phone before handing it over to the AFP and “told untruths when it suited her”.

    The scandal that just keeps on giving… keeps on giving

    At least one of Justice Lee’s findings is indisputable:

    Justice Michael Lee says the Bruce Lehrmann defamation matter has become “a proxy for broader cultural and political conflicts.”

    He said responses to the judgment would vary, due to a variety of responses and attitudes to sexual assault.

    “Some jump to predetermined conclusions because they are disposed to be sceptical about complaints of sexual assault, and hold stereotype beliefs about the expected behaviour of rape victims described by social scientists as rape myths,” he said.

    “Others say they believe all women, surrendering their critical faculties by embracing and acting upon a slogan arising out of the #MeToo movement.

    “Some have predetermined views as to the existence or otherwise of a conspiracy to suppress a rape for political purposes.”

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    The claims of a political conspiracy are blown out of the water.

    Justice Michael Lee says any allegation of a political cover-up of the alleged rape of Brittany Higgins is “objectively short on facts”. (The Australian)

    Which, if nothing else, casts a grave shadow on the Albanese government’s weaponisation of the case.

    The only thing that’s certain about this whole sordid affair is that the media-political class will continue to exploit it for all they can milk. And that a woman who “told untruths when it suited her” is now at least $2.5m richer, courtesy of the same politicians who falsely peddled a “a conspiracy to suppress a rape”, for their own obvious political gain.

    The Enhanced Games

    By
    Damon Hayhow
    -
    4

    Australian Olympic medalist swimmer, James Magnussen, is making news headlines again. He has publicly announced that he plans to “dope [himself] to the eyeballs” to break a swimming world record, and win $1million. The competition’s officials are giving him their full support.

    James is the first high-profile athlete to officially join the proposed ‘Enhanced Games’; an international, multi-sport event with grand plans of competing against the Olympic games for eyeballs, athletes and dollars. The brainchild of another Australian, Aron D’Souza, the Enhanced Games headline point of differentiation is the eschewing of the artificial, arbitrary, performance-limiting, political interference of drug testing.

    The Enhanced Games could also be called the Libertarian Games. Athletes are free to do whatever they want to achieve the maximum of their athletic potential, so long as it does not harm anyone else.

    Most of the efforts of drug testing agencies is brutal harassment of intermediate level amateur athletes for irrelevant test result technicalities

    Predictably, conservatives and liberals alike are screaming bloody murder at the prospects of athletes being free to choose for themselves what they want to do with their bodies to achieve what is important to them. The powerful bureaucracies engaged in sports drug-testing are also enraged.

    Their first reflexive argument against the Enhanced Games is that the use of performance enhancing drugs is cheating. Cheating, by definition, means violating the rules. The Enhanced Games have no rules disallowing the use of drugs, so doping cannot be cheating. 

    Another argument is that it is not fair. In the Enhanced Games, all competitors will have the same access to every technology to maximise their performance; from special suits made of high tech materials to pharmaceutical products, expert advice and monitoring. The democratisation of enhancement technology means no athlete has an unfair advantage; it simply raises the overall level of competition. For an athlete to win in the Enhanced Games, the only exploitable advantages available will be God-given talent and hard work. 

    By contrast, drug tested sport is grossly unfair as a direct result of the drug testing. Drug testing is a political tool used to control who represents sports. Talented athletes deemed to be undesirable representatives of a sport typically face unusually frequent, surprise drug testing, and unusually frustrating accusations of procedural improprieties. Meanwhile, top athletes with the necessary political and/or financial connections are minimally tested, given warning when they will be, have access to technologies to pass tests despite using drugs, and even enjoy mysterious disappearances of positive tests.

    The tests themselves are grossly ineffective. The World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) itself acknowledges that 44% of ostensibly “clean”, WADA-compliant Olympic athletes admit to using banned substances. In other tested sports, such as cycling, the drug use is even more widespread. The Lance Armstrong scandal highlighted how farcical and hopeless the situation is. Armstrong was doping for years, yet never failed a test. But so too were all of his competitors.

    Athletes are free to do whatever they want to achieve the maximum of their athletic potential, so long as it does not harm anyone else.

    Most of the efforts of drug testing agencies is brutal harassment of intermediate level amateur athletes for irrelevant test result technicalities, such as testing positive for irrelevant baking ingredients (glycerol) or non-performance-enhancing nutritional supplements. 

    The infamous 1988 Seoul Olympics continues to be a case study in the true corruption and politicisation of the modern anti-doping movement. Approximately 400 positive drug tests reportedly came out of the testing laboratory for the Seoul Olympics. The positive tests were passed to the Olympic bureaucracy, where they seemingly disappeared. Only 10 athletes were announced to have failed tests.

    The inarticulate and undiplomatic Canadian sprinter, Ben Johnson, was the most high-profile of the failed drug tests. He won the premier Olympic event, the 100-meter sprint, and set a new world record. In second place was the handsome, intelligent, articulate, all-American, hero sprinter, Carl Lewis. Johnson failed the drug test under suspicious circumstances, and his gold medal was given to Lewis. The media then proceeded to paint Johnson as the embodiment of a dirty, rotten, drug cheat. Lewis was heralded as the stunning and brave hero of all that is good and moral, despite some questionable irregularities in some of his own tests. Johnson’s career and reputation was ruined, even though his record remained in the record books.

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    The anti-doping movement has completely failed to stem the use of performance enhancing drugs in sport. If it has achieved anything, it has made sport less fair, less honest and less safe. Like the War on Terror and the Covid sham, the war on drugs in sport was based on lies, and has become a completely corrupt boondoggle for a handful of dishonest technocrats. It now only harms the people it ostensibly exists to protect. 

    It is time to throw drug testing into the dustbin of history. An Australian has come up with a solution and another Australian is the first to jump aboard. All libertarians should get behind the Enhanced Games.

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