Grexit

The panic over the Grexit is an over-reaction. [ Now would be a good time to borrow to buy shares] The Germans and others in Europe are using scare tactics to keep Greece from defaulting on loans, and the loans declining by half their value. It would not be the end of Europe or the Eurozone. Other countries are unlikely to follow. Italy is not Greece. The losers would be the secret, super-wealthy of Europe, whom we used to call the Gnomes of Zurich.
The UK is about vote on staying in Europe, and there is no serious suggestion of them quitting the Pound and joining the Euro (and nor should they, as fourth biggest economy and the leading money market they would dominate Europe). It is just wrong, as George Osborne, the chancellor of the UK said, that Greece voting to leave the Euro would also mean them leaving Europe.
Greece should be helped back into its own currency while staying within Europe. The boundary of the Eurozone must be more porous, so countries can enter and leave in they must to realign their currency after a period of devaluation. It is the “crisis of the day”, but it will blow over, like all crises, and some will benefit and some will lose. One might wonder to what extent the financial crisis is manipulated by those who might otherwise lose, to cover their losses; some people are far too rich to ever lose, because they hold all the purse strings.

Leaders warn Greece will leave EU if it votes no | The Times

European Union leaders have united to warn the Greek people that a ‘no’ vote in Sunday’s referendum would be ‘suicide’, leading to its exit…

thetimes.co.uk

Australian native animals

New Whig

28 June ·

We should not be prevented from befriending and adopting Australian native animals. This writer has become friendly with possums and magpies that now behave like they are my outdoor pets. No doubt other species would be equally as friendly and some perhaps even domesticated (toilet trained). Our colonial heritage insists they are all "wild animals" that are inherently aggressive towards humans and that only by preserving their isolated, "natural" state will the species be preserved and that taming them would somehow destroy them. This is utterly wrong. It probably derives from the Church's teaching that "nature" is "evil", to be dominated and ultimately destroyed.

Aboriginal Australians are regarded by some other Australians in a similar way. They say that Aboriginal nations that have retained their ancient traditions and beliefs should be cut off from "civilisation" as that is the only way to preserve their identity. This is the argument that remote communities should either be utterly isolated and not benefit from any of the benefits of "modernity" or else they should be shut down and the people moved away from their ancestral country.
Similarly, as has been argued here before, Australians should start to see the local endemic vegetation as wild flowers to be cherished not weeds to be destroyed, as is done by nearly every Local Government authority in the nation. As to having a sustaining natural ecosystem around one's house? This is regarded as "gone too far" and "wilderness" that must be tamed and cut down. What is with "nature" strips? They should be left as little strips of "nature" not made into unusable patches of sports fields. Canberra particularly would be spectacular if all the mowed median strips and mowed verges along the many avenues were patches of genuine Aussie bushland. Even the word "bush" has been debased in Australia, now not meaning un-disturbed natural vegetation, but the farming community, ironically opposed to "bush" in its true meaning.

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Naughty Conservatives

There will probably be a spate of unLikes after this, but at the risk of offending some people let me comment on the irony of those people (mostly fanatical Conservatives), who oppose recognising the First Peoples of Australia in our Constitution, now objecting to new immigrants to Australia as invaders of their homeland, forgetting they had invaded and stolen it first. Those who ignored the traditional cultures of the Country of Australia are now having their social cultures challenged by multiculturalism. What goes around comes around.

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Marly McJay Platypus, James Perkins and John Tait like this.

The Princess Royal and Waterloo

New Whig

23 June ·

Three days it took for the Waterloo victory news to reach London, including rowing part way across the Channel. It is a point worth pondering. .

Princess Anne marks moment Britain heard of Waterloo victory | theSundaily

LONDON: Princess Anne on Sunday helped to recreate the moment, 200 years ago, that official news of Britain's victory against Napoleon at Waterloo reached…

thesundaily.my

The True Environmental Villains.

These are the same thugs who are clear-felling our forests and sending our native species extinct. The Forestry industry justifies its existence within the Labo(u)r movement for providing jobs for remote, bush communities, letting them continue to destroy the bush. Far more jobs would be created from eco-tourism, but they are thugs, who like destroying things and don't understand. For too long the Labor Party has profited from the spoils of destroying Australian Bushland. We should be phasing out timber, especially from Native Forests, including the power poles, some of which are enormously high and must have been magnificent, mature trees, home to countless birds, animals and insects before being cut down, probably when all its surrounding bushland was destroyed as well. Of course plantation timber is fine, but all Native Forests, including regrowth as well as pristine forests, should be off limit for harvesting, though already dead wood should be removed for fore prevention as well as for use in furniture. The culture of aggressive destruction that is required for the mass animal slaughter that accompanies "Forrestry" has infected our building industry and led to this extreme point. If the CFMEU came to an end, it could be good for Australia. New Whig as a principle supports Unions, but is against "big Unions" in the same way there is a limit to support for Business, when it starts to become monopolistically "big Business".

CFMEU empire crumbles as union agrees to pay Grocon $3.5m over Emporium blockade

AUSTRALIA’s biggest construction union is under siege amid a record $3.55 million payout, a push for deregistration and an expected flood of further…

heraldsun.com.au

James Perkins It's pretty appalling how much politicians (from both sides) will break their own laws to appease the loggers and the CFMEU.

24 June at 20:51

A Sense of Scale from being a Monarchy

“Prince Charles seems to finally be stepping into the role that his Royal birth has ordained him for.”

Another reason for Australia remaining a Monarchy is that it gives a great sense of scale to Society. The Monarch and the immediate Royal Family are larger than the human people that fill those Social Roles. Presidents by definition are “one of us” and hence share our human scale.
The great World Cities have a civic scale that is greater than the human scale. Melbourne doesn’t quite make it. London has the view up the Mall to the Palace. It has other majestic and massive palaces, including the V&A. Its Churches include the vast. Paris of course built itself a tower that made the city something to be seen as a whole, with a distinctive feature, just when the invention of the aeroplane made viewing a whole city possible. New York built a sky scraper, just as the Depression hit. Sydney was forced into the bridge by its geography, but really hit the spot with the magnificent Opera House, with its sweeping concrete sails on a scale that is civic, not human. By contrast, the interior is almost cosy, being suitable for chamber opera only, not the grandest variety.
Melbourne has little of scale. St Kilda Road is a world class boulevard, and the shrine has the required scale, but they are not enough. Roy Grounds came up with the idea of the spire, and had it been built to his original design it might have rivalled the Opera House as a piece of civic sculpture, but the present structure, even with a small addition, is hardly noticeable from a distance. We need a massive Opera House, perhaps in the presently open Birrarung Marr, perhaps shaped like a Big Footy near the fabled MCG. Melbourne needs something bigger than people. Federation Square has sufficient scale, but downplays the impact with the internal ramp that reduces the size to human scale as well as cutting the whole enterprise off from the river.

We are seeing new generations now of a Monarchy where anyone can marry into the Royal Family, for example in Sweden, where only the spouse of the direct heir received a title and his brother and sister in law did not. Monarchy has become truly democratic as anyone can become part of it, except for the Monarch her or himself which is in direct line. It is a combined system, partly hereditary and partly open to anyone with selection up to Cupid.

UK’S Prince Charles Upstages Socialist French Government at Waterloo - Breitbart

On Wednesday, Prince Charles, the heir to the British throne, led by the bearskin capped regimental band of the famous Coldstream Guards dedicated a new…

breitbart.com

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New Whig I hope I live long enough to see HRH crowned king. I read of an intention for the regnal name of George VII, as had his Grand-Father George VI. Little Prince George will then be George VIII.

30 June at 11:57

The Independent on the Monarchy

Published by The Independent · 13 June ·

This article from The Independent.discusses some important but complex aspects of Monarchy. In particular for Australia, is the suggestion, like a new discovery, that there are two parts to the British Monarchy. "The Royal Household has created a dual-purpose monarch who not only wears the crown but is also a fount of 'soft power', a bulwark against the more venal forces in modern life. Alongside the Queen’s duties as Head of State Britain now has a “Head of Nation”. This is only part of the article. Basically they are distinguishing the Queen's dual position both as Monarch and also "head of state". For Australia there is a major debate over whether the Governor-General is our "head of state" as distinct from the Queen who is Monarch. Both roles have been indistinguishable in the same person for centuries, but in Australia the distinction goes back to Federation. Mr Shorten's argument that we need a local "head of state" fails the Governor-General-test. Note the 80% support for the Monarchy in Britain. Everywhere, support is strongest amongst the young.

The Independent guide to the UK constitution Part 5: The monarchy

Like his father before him and every other member of the House of Windsor with an expectation of becoming monarch, the young Prince George will one day be…

independent.co.uk

Israel WRONGLY condemned for cruelty to Aussie cattle

Published by The Australian · 11 June · 

 

Another example of demonising Israel that by implication denigrates Jews is this misleading article. There is a reference to Kosher slaughter, but in actuallity this abattoir is Halal, not Kosher. The fault belongs to Arab Palestinians, not Jewish Israelis. There was a correction the next day in the letters column, but that is not good enough. The original article should not have been written or published.

Israel condemned for cruelty to Aussie cattle

Fresh allegations have emerged of Australian cattle being brutally slaughtered in an Israeli abattoir accredited and audited under Australia’s export…

theaustralian.com.au

Get Real!!!

New Whig

Surely the most logical argument for anyone to stop their opposition to Australia being a Monarchy is that they should just get with reality. the change they dream about just is not goiing to happen, or certainly not for another century. If the popularity of the young Royals is the reason many people support the status quo then it is a good thing, even if that is not the constitutional reasons that are hard to understand at first. Why be divisive for no benefit? It is sad that The Australian on The Queen's Birthday should print a column calling for a Republic. Why do they bother? Isn't there enough negativity in the world without putting energy into this "lost cause"?

Prince George is the perfect doting brother in first official pics of new royal bub Princess...

FOUR family photographs of royal heirs Princess Charlotte being cradled by her big brother Prince George have been publicly released by their doting parents.

heraldsun.com.au

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Time to revive republic debate

Published by The Australian · 8 June ·

The comments at the end are more interesting than the article, because they rebuff the article eloquently in many voices. It is clear that despite The Australian's editorial line, most of its readers are Monarchists.
The article makes the claim that "Support for a republic does not diminish our respect for the royal family or our British heritage." But destruction is hardly respect, and indeed, anti-British sentiment is behind the Republican push, either from an Irish inf...
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Time to revive republic debate

Twenty years ago, Paul Keating outlined his vision for Australia to become a republic to an evening session of parliament, broadcast live on national television. It was the high point of political leadership on the republic — an idea that once seemed inevitable but is now more elusive than eve…

theaustralian.com.au

Zion

For Jews (except a minority) Jerusalem is the city of Zion, not to be divided again. But the fanciful.Moslem claim to Jerusalem remains with the ultimate purpose of denying Jerusalem to Jews. It is time Australia recognised Jewish Israel. The recent acts by the Pope of recognising "Palestine" have not promoted Peace, but have reinforced the Jewish impression that he is a Jew-hater. Islam must learn to co-exist with other faiths by understanding there is a sort of macro-Islam that is different from sectarian micro-Islams and from other ways of seeing the same complex world. If the deity of the Jewish Torah liked the smell of animal sacrifices, then perhaps the deaths of Holy Martyrs who are self-sacrificing for the same deity and a holy act are equally appealing.

Obama invokes waiver postponing US embassy relocation to Jerusalem

US President Barack Obama invoked a waiver on Wednesday postponing the relocation of the American embassy to Jerusalem for at least…

jpost.com

83 people reached

Roman Catholic church has no right to lobby

It is a victory of Evil over popular opinion for the Australian Government to delay legalising Marriage Equality because of the influence of the Roman Catholic Church. We see the continual exposure of sins against children and the institutionalised concealment of those sins and the continued perpetration of those crimes. That Church, if not all religious authorities by extension, no longer has the right to dictate public morality. In particular the Roman Catholic church has no right to lobby on behalf of the traditional interpretation of heterosexual marriage because of the Church’s utter moral failure in the area of sexual morality.

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Katherine Jacqueline Hear, hear!